Why I Need Your Email and Phone Number (and what I Use it For)
Only recently have I had issues with potential clients not wanting to give me their email or phone number—or sometimes both.
Blocked numbers have been calling me. Users on cuddle platforms don’t want to give me their phone number or email. People email me asking for a session but don’t want to give me their phone number for “privacy concerns.” They ask to meet in person so I know they’re safe instead of giving out their info.
This honestly disturbs me and saddens me. Not only does this tell me there’s a lack of trust in professional cuddlers to protect that information, but it tells me that there’s been trust issues in the past with cuddlers or otherwise with someone else.
Unfortunately, I outright refuse any clients not willing to share this info with me. This is only half of the bare minimum information I need to run my cuddle practice properly, and if this is not something you’re willing to provide me I can’t work with you.
Why do I need both your phone number and email address so much?
At least at the beginning, here’s the 6 main reasons I need your email and phone number:
So I can call you for our pre-session 15 minute phonecall
So I can send you a confirmation email with directions and pre-session info (and track if you got it and read it or not)
So I can send you an invoice for your first session (all first time clients must prepay)
So if you get lost or can’t find parking, I can tell you where to go to help you
So if an emergency happens on either of our ends last minute, we can contact each other and cancel asap (on my end this has happened twice in four years; it has happened countless times on clients’ ends)
So I can follow up with you post-session to check in on you and if you have feedback or reactions after the session (some people have big emotional responses a couple days later)
Later on, I might send you current special promos, text you my booking link so you have it on hand in the future, and generally check in to make sure your needs are being met (because I like to hear if previous clients are doing well and don’t need me anymore because things are going well). I always respect my clients’ wishes if they would rather I call, text or email them when reaching out.
What else do I do with your phone number and email once I have it?
Pretty much nothing unless I need to reach you, and even then you can always ask me to stop reaching out at any time or tell me how I’m allowed to reach out to you. I might ask if you want to be part of my mailing list and check our records to see when the last time I saw you was, but otherwise I don’t do much.
I don’t share your email, phone number, or even our cuddler-client relationship with anyone you don’t ask me to
I imagine many of the concerns I hear are around some people worried that someone will find out they’re seeing a professional cuddler and judge them for it.
The world as a whole isn’t 100% accepting of my profession yet, and there’s still many social and professional circles that still judge my work. I recognize that.
The concerns I’ve heard over and over again was not wanting to get random calls, not wanting their spouse to know (which I have things to say about that too, but that’s another story and not my place to talk about what you do and don’t tell your spouse), not wanting your workplace to find out, etc.
And I understand all of that and respect all of that so much. And I still need your phone number and email address for my own business.
Even if someone called or texted me asking about you specifically I cannot and will not answer without your consent to disclose anything. So your workplace, your spouse, your family, etc wouldn’t be able to ask or talk about you to me without your consent. I can’t confirm that I have your information, have spoken to you, have worked with you, or anything of the likes without your express permission.
The exception would be in an emergency or if you had told me you were planning on doing harm to you or someone else… or otherwise something illegal that would be wrong for me to not tell authorities about what you told me and why I know about it. Other than that, I don’t tell or give anyone that info unless I get your consent.
If I’m not your professional cuddler, do know: not everyone has this policy
Like life coaching, there’s no real regulations in our industry other than trainings we can take and pieces of paper that tell us that we finished a training program and are certified, which are most definitely useful and can give us direction on how to handle professional situations like this. But as we all learned recently, even with those that are certified in some way, there’s no guarantee they’ll respect our boundaries.
This is my policy on how I protect you, your information, and your identity. This isn’t general practice across the industry (though some are beginning to commit to it), but client privacy is something I value highly and this is my personal policy.
If you’re seeing someone else for your sessions, ask them what their policy is on if someone reached out about their sessions, if your spouse or family member called, if your workplace called, or any other number of possibilities you’re concerned about. Their answers may help you trust them more.
And trust is the real issue we’re getting at here. If you can’t trust your cuddler with your phone number and email, can you trust them with your body?