A COUNSELLING service for 12 to 24 year olds in Farnham has been given a glowing report for the sixth year running in an annual survey.

Every year users of the Youth Counselling Service are asked to fill in a questionnaire rating their experiences.

This year 98 per cent of the people asked said they had improved as a result of the counselling they received from the mental health service, while 99 per cent said they would use the service again and 99.6 per cent would recommend it to other young people.

The Youth Counselling Service in Farnham is part of the NHS and provided by Virgin Care. The service offers free, confidential counselling to young people to talk about anything worrying them like relationships, drugs and pregnancy. 

Evaluation results are especially impressive as the service saw a 10 per cent increase of referrals in the last year. The increase in numbers has been followed by the biggest ever number of responses to the questionnaire. The service has taken on eight new counsellors to help keep up with demand.

Feedback from service users rated the service’s self-referral policy very highly. While many other counselling services require referrals from a GP or another third-party, the Youth Counselling Service works predominantly on a self-referral basis, meaning that young people can seek help without needing to involve anybody else.

Taking suggestions from service users, the number of sessions with a counsellor has been increased as standard to nine, after some had said six weren’t enough.

Team leader of the Youth Counselling Service, Kerry Pilbeam said: “We’ve worked really hard to make the young people’s choice to use the service the most important aspect, so that they are in control of their counselling.

“The hard work the team puts in means we continue to provide a service to young people which helps them with any difficulties and we are so pleased with the evaluation we’ve been given by them.”

The Youth Counselling Service is available for 12 to 24 year olds to self-refer by calling 0345 600 2516 or alternatively email youth