Text Counseling Protocols

• At the end of you text shift, remember to log off by pressing the log off button in the top right corner.

• When you are done with a text session, remember to hit “close.”
• Get Demographic Data Early in the text session: Ask for the texters’ names towards the beginning of the text sessions. Ask about school, grade, and age. This is data we need for program evaluation, the ALCO database, future text counselors, and to help in case we need to do a rescue. Find out the texters’ living situations: where texters live and who they live with. This will help us build a sense of their strengths and challenges, and help in case we need to do a rescue.
• Transition strategies when you are getting off a shift:
o Protocols for getting a text from someone 5 minutes before the Text Line shift ends at 11:00.
 Send a message saying that the shift will be ending in x minutes.
 Let them know that if they need immediate help they can call our crisis line.
o You get a message 5 minutes before you are off shift for the 4-8:00 shift and you don’t want to extend your time – you have things to do! What to do?
 Triage just like you would with callers. Check to make sure they are ok and not in immediate crisis. If they are not, let them know another crisis counselor will be with them shortly. Close the session so that the incoming counselor can open the session, once logged on. File this in the brief call. Note that it was a texter and note mobile number as well as call record number if this is a repeat client. OR
 Send a text saying that there may be a x minute wait to text with a counselor and if they need immediate help they can call our crisis number.
o You are in a text session that you absolutely feel should not be ended, and yet you have to go, and you want to hand it off to another counselor. What to do?
 Tell the texter you have to go, and counselor x will be taking over.
 Close your session
 The new counselor will then click on the texter’s mobile number and then click open to proceed.