Kids Helpline is a free, 24 hour, 7 days a week counselling service for Australian kids and young people aged 5 to 25 years.
Help is provided over the phone, email or internet.
PHONE COUNSELLING
When kids call the Kids Helpline, they are connected to a counsellor after listening to a message about the counselling process, including privacy and confidentiality information.
All callers can remain anonymous and all calls remain confidential unless a Duty of Care situation arises.
Calls to the Kids Helpline are free.
WEB COUNSELLING
Web counselling allows young people to talk one-on-one in real time with a Kids Helpline counsellor. It works in the same way as phone counselling, but takes place over the internet.
Kids are required to read through information on the counselling process, privacy and confidentiality, before they are connected to a Kids Helpline counsellor.
Online counselling is very popular, and often young people need to wait to connect to a counsellor. The service allows kids to know how many other ‘users’ are waiting before them so that they can gauge the wait time.
Web counselling is available at specific times each week. Web counselling times can be viewed on the Kids Helpline website (www.kidshelp.com.au/grownups/getting-help/).
EMAIL COUNSELLING
Young people can access the Kids Helpline email counselling (counsellor@kidshelp.com.au) 7 days a week.
Email counselling is also very popular so it can take a while for a counsellor to respond to an email. Kids Helpline suggests for kids to use the phone counselling service (phone 1800 55 1800) if their problem is urgent, or if they need to speak with someone straight away.