Clinical wills: Six key questions to ask

Confident Therapist Hub · Practice management · 9 min read

A clinical will is a set of professional instructions for what should happen to your practice if you die or become unable to work. This article explains what a clinical will is, the people involved, what it should contain, and six questions to use when checking whether your arrangement will work.

What BACP requires. From midday on 3 November 2026, the BACP 2026 Ethical Framework, section 4.5(e), requires members to have a clinical will and appoint an executor who is bound by confidentiality and can communicate with clients and service users if the member cannot contact them or has died.

Other professional bodies have different requirements and guidance. These include BABCP, BPC, BPS, UKCP, NCPS and HCPC, and are set out in the sister article.

What a clinical will is

A clinical will is a set of professional instructions for closing or transferring your practice if you die or become unable to work. It is separate from your legal will and from a power of attorney. Your legal will deals with your personal affairs. A power of attorney allows another person to act on your behalf while you are alive, subject to its terms. A clinical will deals with your professional practice.

A clinical will normally names a trusted colleague, supervisor or other suitable professional as the clinical executor. The executor agrees in writing to contact clients and supervisees and tell relevant people and organisations what has happened. The executor should be bound by confidentiality and should have only the access needed for the role.

The professional bodies do not all define the executor's responsibilities in the same way. The person who carries out the communication and continuity arrangements may not be the person who becomes responsible for the records afterwards.

A clinical will has two parts

The first is your signed instructions. This is a letter to your executor, completed and signed while you are well. Ideally, it contains no client information. It should be stored securely. Your executor keeps a copy.

The second is the contact information and access details the executor needs. These can remain in your existing records, kept up to date as part of your normal practice. The key or password can be held separately and passed to the executor when needed by your initiator.

The initiator is the person who tells the executor that something has happened and provides the access needed.

If you are not a sole trader. This article assumes you hold your own client records in your own name. If you work through a limited company, clinic, agency, therapy platform, partnership or employer, the organisation may be responsible for the records and may already have a procedure for what happens if you die or become unable to work. Establish who holds the records and what procedure applies before writing your instructions.

The people involved

A clinical will can involve several people. The professional bodies do not all require the same roles.

The initiator

Usually the person you live with or a close family member. They contact your executor and provide or point them to the access they need. The initiator should not have access to clinical information unless they need it for their role.

The clinical executor

A colleague, supervisor or other suitable professional who has agreed in writing to carry out the instructions. They may contact clients and supervisees, tell relevant organisations, carry out the communication arrangements, and deal with records where the instructions or professional-body requirements make this part of their role.

Your supervisor

A supervisor can provide another route to the executor if the initiator cannot act, and may be able to advise the executor about clients who need particular care when contacted. NCPS describes this as good practice in its supervision guidance. It is not a stated requirement of all the bodies covered here.

What goes into it

Four decisions to make while you are well.

Who acts, and how do they find out?

Include:

the executor's name and contact details
confirmation that they have agreed to the role
a backup executor, if you have one
what happens if the first executor cannot act
the initiator's name and number
your supervisor's details, if they are part of the arrangement.

It is useful to record when you discussed the arrangement with the people involved.

Where are the client details, and how does the key reach them?

State where the client details are stored and how the executor will gain access.

The client information can remain in your existing records. The password, passcode or physical key can be held separately and passed to the executor by the initiator when required.

If you're not sure where your notes are stored, whether that is an app, a cloud account, or a folder on your laptop, the article Safe apps and voice typing walks through how to check.

The instructions should not contain the password or key. Keeping the location and access details separate reduces the risk of unauthorised access.

The access route should be tested while you are able to correct any problems.

Who else needs telling, and what about the money?

Your instructions can identify other people or organisations that need to be told, such as:

your professional body
your indemnity insurer
your supervisor
an agency or organisation you receive referrals from
online directories or other public listings.

You can also state who is responsible for outstanding payments. The clinical executor may deal with payments, or this may be handled by the person dealing with your personal affairs. The arrangement should state clearly who is responsible.

A clinical executor does not automatically have responsibility for financial matters simply because they are the clinical executor.

What finally happens to the records?

Your instructions should state what should happen to your records after the practice has closed.

Records may need to be retained for professional, legal, insurance or safeguarding reasons. The person or organisation holding the records is responsible for them while they remain in its control.

Some practitioners instruct that records should be destroyed when the relevant retention period ends. Others arrange for a named person or organisation to hold them until that point.

Retention periods vary

BABCP recommends seven years from the last session, based on advice from its legal advisers. BPS states that many independent psychologists retain adult records for seven years. BPC's guidance does not specify a retention period.

BABCP's Private Practice Guidelines also refer to the NHS Records Management Code, which sets longer periods for some mental health and psychology records. Seven years is therefore not a universal legal retention period.

Records relating to children and young people may need to be retained for longer. The appropriate period can depend on the setting, the client's age, safeguarding issues, potential claims, professional requirements and insurance terms.

Your insurer's policy may specify a retention period. Check the policy before putting a retention period into your clinical-will instructions.

If a complaint, claim or records request is live. Do not destroy records that may be relevant to an active or reasonably anticipated complaint, claim, investigation or records request. Destruction should be put on hold until you have established that the records are no longer required. Tell your indemnity insurer where appropriate.

A request from a living client to access their records normally has to be answered without undue delay and within one month, subject to the rules on identity, clarification and extensions. The one-month period starts when the request is received.

The clinical executor is not necessarily the person who deals with the request. Their role may be to identify the request and pass it to the person responsible for the records. Who becomes responsible depends on the structure of the practice and the arrangements in place, and the professional bodies differ. The sister article explains those differences.

Six questions to test the arrangement

Your instructions and contact information can be held on paper, in your practice system, on a platform or in an encrypted file. Whatever system you use, check that the process works.

1. Will it still work if the provider does not exist by then?

A clinical will may not be needed for many years. Companies close. Services change. Subscriptions can end.

Some services require an executor to request access or wait for a verification process. This may delay access to the information needed to contact clients.

Check whether your executor would have access to the information itself, or would depend on a third-party service remaining available.

2. Is the contact list current?

Client information changes regularly. New clients start. Clients end. Contact details change. It may for example come to light that one of your clients needs handling carefully due to complex trauma around bereavement and endings.

This means careful and timely updating of your records. Therefore an additional contact list set up elsewhere creates another set of information that must be kept up to date.

One option is to keep a single authoritative client record rather than maintaining a separate manually updated list. Whatever system you use, the information needs to remain current and the executor needs a workable way to access it.

This is a recommended approach rather than a requirement imposed by the professional bodies.

If a paid system holds the client list, check whether it would still be accessible if payment had stopped or the company had ceased operating.

3. Who holds the details meanwhile, and how much does my executor see?

A clinical will containing client information is subject to the same confidentiality, data protection and security requirements as other records containing personal information.

If information is held on a platform, the platform and its service providers form part of the data protection arrangements. If information is held on your own device or on paper, you remain responsible for appropriate security, encryption and backups where relevant.

Your executor needs enough information to carry out the role. This may include names, contact details and information needed to contact clients safely. Access to routine session notes is a separate issue. Decide whether the executor needs access to them.

There should also be a route to the records if they are needed because of:

a request from a client
a complaint
a claim
an insurer's request
a safeguarding concern
an investigation.

Whoever holds the records should be named in the arrangement, should have agreed to the role and should be reachable within the relevant timescale.

4. What does it cost over ten or twenty years?

Some clinical will services involve a regular fee. Calculate the total cost over the period you expect to use the service. Generally speaking, many services are simply data storage with nothing else happening apart from you keeping the client details up to date.

Many therapists choose to store and encrypt files such as spreadsheets and word documents securely on their own devices and on their own personal cloud accounts.

Basic backups, encryption and password protection make this entirely adequate for UK GDPR purposes. In many ways data is more secure because there is only one data processor - you.

5. Does my executor need an account, or just the instructions and the key?

Every additional step can delay access. Examples include:

creating an account
requesting files
recovering a password
waiting for a provider to confirm incapacity or death
relying on a third-party service to remain available.

A simpler arrangement may allow the executor to act using the signed instructions they already hold and the separate password, passcode or key provided by the initiator.

Keep passwords out of the instructions document itself.

Check the access route to the contact information. Establish whether information can be exported and opened without access to a particular platform or software.

6. Does it say what happens after the calls are made?

A clinical will should explain what happens after clients and other relevant people have been contacted. Four areas should be covered.

Who becomes responsible for the records

After your death, responsibility for the records may pass to your personal representative or to another person or organisation that lawfully takes control of the information. The clinical executor may or may not be that person.

State who you expect to take responsibility and how that role relates to the clinical executor.

If you have appointed an attorney to act while you are alive but unable to work, this is a separate role. A lasting power of attorney ends when you die. State who acts during incapacity and who acts after death.

Requests to see records

A request from a living client normally has to be answered without undue delay and within one month, subject to the rules on identity, clarification and extensions. The period starts when the request is received.

The client's right of access does not end because the therapist has died. The person responsible for the records must deal with the request.

Live complaints, claims and investigations

If a complaint, claim, investigation or records request is active or reasonably anticipated, do not destroy records that may be relevant to it. Keep destruction on hold until the records are no longer required. Check your indemnity insurance terms for any specific requirements.

The limits of the executor's role

State clearly what the clinical executor is expected to do. If their role is limited to contacting clients, supervisees and other relevant people, say so.

If they are expected to carry out additional tasks, such as dealing with records or responding to requests, they should agree to those responsibilities in advance and the instructions should state them clearly.

A note on paper

Paper instructions can work for a clinical will if you prefer this format and you can arrange for them to be kept securely. A paper contact list needs to be updated manually. Set a regular date to check the information and update it where necessary.

The only downside to paper is that if there is only one copy and there is a flood, fire or other unfortunate event that destroys the documents, then the list is simply not there. It is recommended to keep secure copies of paper files in at least two different locations.

If you remember five things

A clinical will should identify the people who will act and what each person is responsible for.
The client information should be kept current and there should be a workable route to it.
The instructions should state what happens to the records and who is responsible for them.
Live complaints, claims, investigations and records requests may require you to pause any plans for destruction until settled.
The arrangement should be tested to make sure it works.

Ready to write yours?

Subscribers to the Confident Therapist Hub newsletter receive our complete clinical will template, free. It is written in plain English and covers the executor's role, access to client information, records and the initiator's role.