Frequently Asked Questions
Sustainable Therapy is an online therapy platform that makes it possible for users to receive therapy online conveniently and affordably.
All therapists on Sustainable Therapy are licensed, experienced, and accredited psychologists (Ph.D. / Psy.D.), licensed professional counselors (LPC), licensed marriage and family therapists (LMFT), licensed mental health counselors, (LMHC), or licensed clinical social workers (LCSW), and have a Master’s Degree or a Doctorate Degree in their field.
All therapists have been certified by their state professional licensing board after successfully completing the required education, exams, training, practice, and experience and are qualified to provide therapeutic services to you. That’s not all. We also make sure they are passionate about helping and are committed to working through issues compassionately with you.
The brief information you fill out will help us in matching you with a qualified therapist who has experiences in working with the expressed concerns. Make sure you choose a weekly/monthly plan and make a payment. Only after payment is completed, your account would be activated for us to match you with one of our licensed and professional therapist within 24 hours (or 48 hours if during weekends or holidays). When a therapist contacts you, you’ll be notified by email. Then you can go to “My Sessions” in your account to start working with your therapist. You can also change therapist at any time if the current therapist does not fit your needs. We want you to be comfortable with who you work with.
Many have found online therapy to provide the convenience, flexibility, and affordability in sustaining their mental health. What differentiates us is that we not only select a team of licensed, experienced, and qualified therapists to provide therapeutic service to you, we make sure they really have the heart to help. Why? Because we believe our clients deserve the most professional, ethical, compassionate, helpful, and passionate clinicians to work with.
Sustainable Therapy is not the right fit for you if any of the following applies:
- You have thoughts or intentions of hurting yourself or others
- You are a minor or you are under the care of a legal guardian
- You are in an emergency situation or in an urgent crisis that need to be attended to immediately
- You are required to obtain therapy by a court order or by other authorities
- You do not have a computer that can properly connect to the Internet or you do not have a dependable internet connection
- You are recommended to be under psychological supervision or psychiatric care or if you have been diagnosed with a severe mental illness that immobilizes your ability to function.
After you fill out the brief information form and complete payment, we will connect you with a therapist that best fits your needs. Your therapist will reach out to you and send you a welcoming message within 24-48 hours.
Therapy officially begins! There is a designated, private, and secure “session room” established between you and your therapist. The session room of your account is open 24/7, so you can message your therapist as frequently as you prefer and write as lengthy as you need, anytime and anywhere. Since the writing sessions aren’t in real-time, no scheduling is needed- you can write at your own pace at the comfort of your own place. Every time your therapist messages you, you will receive an e-mail notification. All conversations between you and your therapist are encrypted, secure, and confidential. They will stay between you and your therapist. If you feel your therapist isn’t right for you, you can switch therapist at any time. Again, we want you to be comfortable with who you work with.
Absolutely. If you have a specific therapist in mind that you'd like to work with, simply e-mail us at contact@sustainabletherapy.com and we'll connect you to your preferred therapist.
The length and frequency of the sessions between you and your therapist may vary depending on your needs and hopes, as well as your therapist’s working style and preferences. Some folks prefer to have short and frequent communications, while others prefer to have long, thorough, and less frequent conversations. For example, some may exchange several brief conversations with their therapists each day, while some write 3-4 longer messages a week. It all depends on your and your therapist’s preference. Your usage might also change from time to time, with more frequent engagements during times of need and tougher periods in life, and less frequently during other times.
For each therapist's individual availability and the frequencies of engagement you can expect, please refer to the therapist's profile information. We encourage you to talk to your therapist early on about your hopes and expectations of your communications to ensure satisfaction. Our therapists will do their best to accommodate your needs.
Sustainable Therapy charges a flat subscription fee that allows you to use the online platform and have unlimited writing sessions with your therapist, anytime, anywhere. We have two subscription options:
- Best Value plan (lowest fee) is $35/week, charged monthly
- Basic plan is $39/week, charged weekly
We also have phone sessions available depending on your preference:
Complimentary Phone Sessions without Writing: If you only hope to have phone sessions with your therapist without the writing, some of our therapists offer complimentary phone sessions each week that goes along with your subscription at no extra cost to you. For each therapist's individual availability of complimentary phone minutes without writing sessions, please refer to the therapist's profile information. If you want to have additional phone minutes on top of the weekly complimentary phone meetingss, click on "Purchase Phone Session with My Therapist" on your account, select the additional duration you'd like to add onto the existing weekly complimentary phone minutes and make a payment.
Phone Sessions on Top of Unlimited Writing: If you want to have phone sessions on top of unlimited writing, phone appointments will be charged separately with 3 options- 30 minutes, 60 minutes, or 90 minutes. Simply click on "Purchase Phone Session with My Therapist" on your account, select the duration, and make a payment.
When you feel you’re doing much better and are not in need of therapy anymore, you can cancel service any time before your next billing cycle to stop future payments. You can also re-start service at any time. Just like that, simple and straightforward.
No, you can have unlimited writing sessions with your therapist. You can write as frequent and as long as you need. The length and frequency of the sessions between you and your therapist may vary, depending on your needs and preferences and your therapist’s working style and preferences. Some folks prefer to have short and frequent communications, while others prefer to have long, thorough, and less frequent conversations. For example, some may exchange several brief conversations with their therapists each day, while some write 3-4 longer messages a week. It all depends on your and your therapist’s preference. Your usage might also change from time to time, with more frequent engagements during times of need and tougher periods in life, and less frequently during other times.
For each therapist's individual availability and the frequencies of engagement you can expect, please refer to the therapist's profile information. We encourage you to talk to your therapist early on about your hopes and expectations of your communications, to ensure satisfaction. Our therapists will do their best to accommodate to your needs.
Yes, our therapists can provide service in Mandarin (中文), Spanish ( Español), and Dutch (Nederlands). If you'd like to talk to a therapist that is fluent in any of these languages, contact us and we'll make sure you get connected with each other. We want you to receive counseling in the language you feel most comfortable in!
Our therapists serve as independent providers that offer therapeutic services. These providers are not employees of Sustainable Therapy and the site doesn't monitor them professionally due to confidentiality and security concerns. We do our best to screen our therapists in ensuring their credentials and sustain quality of care. We also evaluate their effectiveness in helping through our users’ feedback and testimonials. It’s our mission to maintain a secure, confidential, convenient, and affordable platform that connects users with therapists to have therapeutic sessions.
It is our #1 priority to protect the confidentiality of your therapeutic conversations and the security of our platform. Here’s how we are protecting your confidentiality and privacy so you can use our platform with ease, knowing that we have your best interest in mind:
- Our platform is HIPAA-compliant (The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act).
- We use banking-grade 256 bit encryption so all of your communications with your therapist are encrypted and will stay between you and your therapist. It is private, secure, and confidential.
- We use SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) in maintaining an encrypted link between our server and browsers. It ensures that all data passed between our server and your browsers remain private and secure.
- We do not work or cooperate with any employers or insurance companies, so we have no obligation to share or file any information with them.
- Your conversations with your therapist are protected by strict state and federal laws.
- All existing confidentiality rules and limitations from traditional therapy apply to our online platform.
- Our therapists adhere to all applicable federal and state laws and local regulations, as well as following strict ethical and professional standards.
We don’t accept insurance. However, our price is comparable, and in most cases, cheaper than the copays of your insurance plans. We offer very affordable pricing options.
We are unable to offer a free trial in order keep our prices affordable. If you’re unsure whether this service is right for you, we suggest you sign up with the weekly subscription (as opposed to monthly subscription) so you can more readily decide whether you want to continue. At the same time, it is our mission to provide counseling services to those in need. We offer a limited number of free counseling for those with low-income every month. Because the amount of one-week free counseling we can provide are limited, please e-mail us at contact@sustainabletherapy.com to inquire about our availability. We may also ask to see your W-2 for proof of income. You can also possibly get a free week of counseling if you “like” our Facebook page, we will randomly select a few individuals each month to receive a one-week free counseling. Please visit our page and click “like”: https://www.facebook.com/sustainabletherapy/
If you have any special offers, please email us at contact@sustainabletherapy.com to redeem your offer.
You can cancel service any time before your next billing cycle to stop future payments. You can also re-start service at any time. Just like that, simple and straightforward.
Simply click on the “Sign Up Now,” fill in your basic information, select a subscription option, make a payment, then you’re ready to begin therapy!
You’re free to change therapist at any time. When you change therapist, you can expect to be connected to another therapist within 24 hours. If it is during the weekends or Holidays, it may take up to 48 hours for a counselor to reach out to you.
All of our therapists are exceptionally qualified and experienced to work with clients and have caring hearts to help. However, a mismatch can certainly happen when you feel like you just aren’t clicking. You can change therapist at any time to be matched with another qualified therapist, no strings attached. You don’t need an authorization from us or from your current therapist to change to a different therapist. We want you to feel comfortable with who you work with. We also strongly encourage you to discuss any concerns with your therapist when you feel your needs aren’t being addressed adequately, so you can collaboratively work together to meet your hopes. Your therapist will appreciate your honesty, and can greatly benefit from hearing your feedback even if you have to part ways. You can always contact us, too, regarding any concerns and dissatisfactions.
For your protection, we use PayPal to process payment in order to ensure secure and encrypted payment processing. If you don’t have a PayPal account, you can create one here!
First and foremost, we care deeply about your well-being and we believe our clients deserve the most professional, ethical, compassionate, helpful, and passionate clinicians to work with. So we purposefully don’t recruit a large pool of therapists. We carefully select only a small team of licensed, professional, and experienced therapists who truly have the hearts to help. Secondly, we believe therapy should not be a luxury but something that should be sustainable, so we keep our fees at an affordable rate. Thirdly, we are committed to providing a certain number of one-week free counseling for individuals with low-income every month even at a cost to ourselves because we believe in the value of giving back to our communities. Last but not least, we adhere to a top-notch security protocol to ensure our online platform adheres to HIPAA standards and further protects your confidentiality and privacy. With our commitment to quality and your emotional well-being, our genuine care for our communities, and our responsibility of protecting your security and confidentiality, you can trust that we have your best interests in mind like no others.
Give our service a try and you'll notice the difference in quality we provide!
We’re always looking for therapists who are licensed, experienced, compassionate, AND passionate about helping. If you are interested in joining our growing community of online therapists, please email us to inquire about the interview process. You will need to be a psychologist (Ph.D. / Psy.D.), licensed marriage and family therapist (LMFT), licensed clinical social worker (LCSW), or a licensed professional counselor (LPC) in order to be considered.
