Clay: Hello and welcome to episode 11. I’m Clay Cockrell and I have to warn you that the beginning of this interview was a little iffy because we were having a few connection problems. It wasn’t bad but there are a few pauses as we tried to fix it, but it eventually caught up. About 2 or 3 minutes in, it seemed to resolve and we had a really great discussion. I didn’t know. It was kind of frustrating at the beginning, but I promise you, it gets better because I want you to hang in there. This is one of the best interviews ever.
My guest today is Buck Black of truckertherapy.com. He does phone and video conferencing counseling with truckers and their families. It’s an incredible niche specialty. He’s really knowledgeable about this population, and really meeting a need, I think. As you will hear, I’m a pretty big fan of his and have followed him for years, but this was our first contact, which I’m finding is a really cool thing about doing this podcast is I get to talk to some of my heroes in the field and he’s definitely one. It was a free flowing interview, talking about the challenges of online counseling, the different platforms that are available, HIPAA compliant issues. No holds barred. We really got into some really good stuff.
This was recorded on January 26, 2016, just a few days after the big super snowstorm that hit New York. The streets outside my office are really bad and that leads to maybe a bit more honking than is normal. There’s a little New York frustration happening out there, I think. As always I tell listeners, you get a little taste of New York when you listen to this podcast because my window is really thin, but today, we probably got a bigger taste than usual. I hope it’s not too distracting because we have some really good information in this podcast. Okay, here we go. Episode 11, Buck Black of truckertherapy.com.
Hi and welcome to the Online Counselling Podcast. My name is Clay Cockrell and I am thrilled today to welcome Buck Black of truckertherapy.com to the show. Buck, welcome.
Buck: Hi, Clay. Thanks for having me.
Clay: Absolutely. I don’t know if you are aware of this, but I have and there’s no reason why you would be, but I followed your practice for several years now because when I first started out doing Walk and Talk therapy, I wanted to try to find other therapists that had a different approach and yours obviously came up to the very top of having an approach where you focus on truckers and their industry. I feel like I’ve gotten to know you over the years.
Buck: Well, Clay, I appreciate that and that’s very flattering. I know that one of your recent podcast that there was a discussion about how we get a following when we have an online presence. I think this is a very good proof, so, very nice.
Clay: Good, good, good. One of the technology I just want to be aware, I don’t know if you can sense this but there seems to be a little bit of delay in our connection. Are you hearing me okay?
Buck: Unfortunately, it’s cutting out some and maybe all the words are reaching me, but there’s just spaces where it’s delayed, so yes.
Clay: Okay. I want to make sure that this is, because this is really important. I want to put a spotlight on your practice and learn about you. If anytime you’re not getting the questions or hearing me, let me know. This is part of the challenge, I think, of doing online work. Sometimes the connection helps, sometimes it gets in the way, but there you are. Let’s jump right in, though.
Buck: Exactly. Yes and I find myself saying the same things to my clients on a regular basis, so yes because sometimes the connection is good, sometimes it’s not.
Clay: We’ll soldier on. Just give me the background of truckertherapy.com. How did you get started doing this and how long have you done it?
Buck: Well, I’ve been doing this for about six years now and what happened was when I was a new therapist, I had a lot of truck driving clients just simply by chance. I mean, I live in the state of Indiana and it is one of the most populous states for truck drivers. It’s the crossroads of America and all of this. What I noticed real quickly was either my clients that were truck drivers, they either had to spend time off the road in order to do therapy, so that meant lost income or what happened more likely was they just simply didn’t get therapy. So, I was like, “Okay. This isn’t good. How can we fix this? How can we make this better?” I’ve always been a fan of technology and we’re reaching out to people, and just simply doing something different. I thought, “Wow, this is like common sense. I need to specialize in truck drivers.” I’m a big kid at heart and I always think that trucks are so cool. Truck drivers are usually some of the nicest people out there and I thought, “Hey, we can make this work.” So, that’s the whole idea of Trucker Therapy.
Clay: It’s amazing. They talk about in so many of the private practice coaches that I’ve talked with on the show the importance of finding a niche, a specialty, and that you frequently are going to have clients outside that specialty but you have to have a focus and you certainly have that.
Buck: Yes, get more narrow and more defined. You do something that’s different, you do something that stands out and I’ll tell you why. When I’m talking with either a driver or a family member of a driver and they know that I specialize in truck driving and they know that they can come to my office or I can talk to them online or on the phone, they usually feel so much more at ease. I think that it helps the clients tremendously.
Clay: Right because you’ve got a vocabulary all set. I think one statement on your website that stuck out to me was that truckers would come in and they would say they spend the first half of the first session explaining their job.
Buck: Yeah, exactly.
Clay: And here, you don’t have to do that. You know the job.
Buck: Exactly, yeah. They don’t waste their time and their money educating their therapist about what they do and about how tricky it is and all of this. Yeah, I get a lot of positive feedback in that area.
Clay: Good. Now, you’ve been doing this for six years. Have you seen it steadily grow from where you started?
Buck: Oh, I certainly have. In the beginning, no one wanted to talk to me. No one thought that I was real. What kind of therapist specializes in truckers? I even call myself a trucker therapist so they are like, “What is that?” and it’s a whole idea of educating. Believe it or not, my big break was when I reached out, I was reaching out to several different organizations and there’s an organization that’s just fantastic. It’s called Women in Trucking. This is the niche within the niche, okay. Women drivers are like roughly 3% maybe 5%, it depends who you talk to, of the drivers. This is a very small subset. I told them what I was doing and then I formed a relationship with them. It has bloomed from there. That’s how I got my in and as we all know, it’s all about relationships and when I was able to make that quality relationship with Women in Trucking then it branched out. I’m still in the process of making relationships and growing, but that was the real tipping point and I thought that was really neat and that was really amazing.
Clay: Yeah, I saw on your blog, I think it was your blog that you have been working to bring a mammogram truck to some trucking conference.
Buck: Mm-hmm.
Clay: So I’m assuming that association with the Women in Trucking.
Buck: It is all related, yes, and I can’t really take the credit for that. I am a board member of the St. Christopher’s Fund and what that is it helps truck drivers who need assistance with medical bills. If they are off the road due to medical problems then we can help with the rent and so on. It’s a charity for the truck drivers and since my name got out there then I became this board member and then that’s some services as a board that we’ve all been working on to provide those mammograms and some various other fund raising activities for the drivers that are in need. That’s a fantastic other piece that I’m involved in with the trucking industry.
Clay: Wow, talk about being immersed in an industry and really to know who the movers and shakers, and creating a name recognition and reputation within that industry. It seems like that has been your focus and successfully.
Buck: Yeah, yeah. It’s really neat and if you look at this industry, there are, oh, maybe a few dozen names that are the big players. You get to know them and then you use those connections to be able to get to a point where you can help all of these truck drivers that are in need. So, I have truck drivers who find me just simply through the website, through a basic Google search, and then I have other truck drivers that they find me because someone at their company has told them about Trucker Therapy or an organization like Women in Trucking tell them about me. It goes from there and it just feels really good to be able to help those drivers and still half the time, they are calling me and saying, “Now, what is it that you do? I’ve never heard of this. Are you for real?” That kind of thing.
Clay: But there’s a community among because I think of truckers as kind of an isolated job. You’re in a truck many times alone, but there’s truck stops and etc. but you’re talking. There’s a community out there that helps to support them.
Buck: Yeah, there definitely is and I go to a couple of the popular truck shows and that is definitely a trucking community right there. With my trucking clients, most of them are quite isolated. Not all of them but many of them are and I help to hook them up with the community whether it be on Facebook and Twitter, or going to the truck shows or getting involved in some of the trucking organizations. I talk with the client about what’s right for them and that’s something that just helps them so much with these isolation concerns.
Clay: I’m just having a flashback. When I got out of college, I took a road trip from Kentucky to New York. I broke down in Frystown, Pennsylvania, which is this tiny little town by the highway and it had a massive truck center, a traveling center. I was there for 4-5 days in a tiny little hotel room in this truck center and there really was this community. They all kind of came in and they knew the waitress. I guess they had a special route. I’m sorry, I’m just having a flashback to Frystown, Pennsylvania.
Buck: Well, I’m glad that you’re something positive about truckers because so many times, there’s negativity thrown at the profession. I’m glad that you have some good memories there. That’s great.
Clay: Absolutely. They were very kind to this lost kid from Kentucky. It got me through five lonely days. Okay, what would you say your percentage of client list is in the trucking industry? Is it all truckers or are you also working outside of that?
Buck: Well, it’s interesting how the percentages work here. I have an office, a regular physical office in Lafayette, Indiana and about the face to face that I do is probably about two-thirds. The other third of what I do is trucker therapy related. I hesitate with saying that the third that I do that’s trucker therapy related, they are not all truckers and some of them are people who find the trucker therapy to be so fascinating but they are not truckers themselves. They are like, “Wow, you do something different. You must be innovative. I want to get to know you,” and then we do some phone sessions or we do some video conferencing, or maybe they come into the office. That’s a subset of the trucker therapy that I never expected. It’s really interesting.
Clay: That is interesting. I mean, that’s what everybody says about it. So many therapists are afraid to create a niche because they are going to isolate themselves from this other market out there, but you’re saying that you’re getting a different market because people see you as innovative. You’re not limited by your niche.
Buck: Exactly, exactly and there’s been times that I’ll have just quite successful business people. They will come into the office and they are local. They will spend 5-10 minutes of their time asking about trucker therapy. They have no idea about truckers and they have never been interested before and then yes, they want to know more and they become more invested in the therapy process as a result. It’s quite interesting.
Clay: Oh yeah. That’s incredible. Alright. Now, looking at your modality – phone, Skype, face to face or Facetime – how has that changed and what’s your learning curve because you have been doing this for six years? What has it been like for you? What have you learned along the way with the challenges of doing online counsel?
Buck: Well, I think, let’s see here. There’s been several challenges but yet, it has been fairly straightforward. With the truckers, they really like to use the phone because in general, truck drivers, they are less tech savvy, though I don’t want to offend any of my drivers out there. There are plenty of them that are all about it, but you think about the phone. It’s a very solid standard tool that we use on a regular basis. We go that route quite a bit. There are some people who they are just not comfortable with using any technology whatsoever including the telephone and they want to do some face to face stuff. That’s just fine, but so many times, if the client is comfortable with the technology, then it’s great and there are no issues.
I know that you’ve mentioned in your podcast before that there are times that you have to shut off the sound to the video and then use the phone for the audio sessions. We’ve done that several times. That is a challenge, just the typical pieces of that that come up on a regular basis, but I feel that Trucker Therapy is branded well enough that the potential clients understand how it works. They get the idea and they are either telling me, “Hey, I want to do phone or I want to do video conference or I want to do email” and then you go from there. It works pretty smoothly.
Clay: They kind of lead what they feel comfortable with.
Buck: Yes and that’s something that I have learned that I need to let the client take the lead and not push the modality because I’ve gotten myself in trouble with that before of they are just not so comfortable with whatever modality and then the services are not nearly as effective.
Clay: Yeah and it’s all about being effective and meeting them where they are, right?
Buck: Right, right. It definitely is, yes.
Clay: Now, as a therapist though, when you’re doing this work and you’re connecting in different ways, have you noticed that there is a difference in the connection for you with the client over phone versus over video conference?
Buck: Well, again, it goes back to the comfort with the client and I think that I feel comfortable using any mode. Whatever the client is most comfortable with then I feel more relaxed. Now, I might be a little bit different here because I really got my start about 15 years ago at crisis center. It was all phone work. I’ve got over 500 hours of volunteering at the Lafayette Crisis Center. I’ve talked to, ranging from suicidal people that are in grave danger to people calling for some minor issues. I’ve spent so much time on the phone that I feel so comfortable with that and usually, I can pick up on the small size and just the nuances in the voice. There are a lot of therapists that are not so comfortable doing any kind of phone work, so I think that might be why I’m pretty cool about using the phone and I’m not worried about it.
Clay: Yeah, it makes sense, I mean, with all the experience that you had. You’ve got training in it, just hours and hours. It’s interesting. I haven’t posted it yet, but the podcast I did with Kelly and Miranda of ZynnyMe, I think it was Miranda who said she tried the online video conference and it didn’t feed her. It didn’t feel like she was making an impact and what brought her to therapy. She’s not pursuing that, but for coaching, she’s all about, “I can coach other therapists.” Video conference, not a problem, but the therapy connection that she needed, it just wasn’t there. It’s really individual from therapists to therapists what you are comfortable doing.
Buck: Yeah, most definitely and then with the clients who have not such good equipment or just simply a poor connection. When they are a blur in front of you and then the sound isn’t so great, then obviously, that impacts it. That would be a concern.
Clay: I get it. It’s so frustrating.
Buck: Yeah, it definitely is.
Clay: The question that keeps going to my mind and you answer it to your comfort level, but what kind of rules or limits do you put around talking with the trucker on the phone to make sure that he’s pulled over to the side of the road or is that not a big deal for you?
Buck: Yeah, that’s something that people ask me on a regular basis and yes. I do ask that my drivers or anyone to not be driving or doing anything dangerous while they are talking with me. I have to let them be on their honor there and these truck drivers, they have noise canceling mics and they have really sophisticated headsets that look more like a large headset that you would use as a regular telephone operator. They could be driving and not letting me know. That is a concern but nonetheless, we talk about just the importance of making sure that they are parked. Yeah.
Clay: Alright. That’s the first thing that came into my mind and obviously to others too.
Buck: Exactly. The last thing we need is somebody being emotional when they are driving 80,000 lbs down the road. That would not be a good thing.
Clay: Good. I’m getting ready to take a road trip to Florida in a few weeks and I’m glad I’m not going to think about that.
Buck: Yes, yes.
Clay: Because if truckers are doing it, it just scares me to death, with texting and driving and all that.
Buck: I know.
Clay: Okay. Tell me a little bit about some of the common issues that you’re hearing in this population?
Buck: Well, commonly, it would be relationship problems and I tell people just in my practice overall that I specialize in anger, stress, and relationships. That’s like my one line elevator speech. Who isn’t coming to therapy that isn’t dealing with one or maybe all three of those issues? Truck drivers, really, they are dealing with the same thing. They are people and by default, they are in long distance relationships because they are out on the road for at least days at a time, usually, it weeks at a time and sometimes even months, so yeah. We do a lot of work on helping them to connect with their loved ones, their family, their friends and deal with all that isolation. Of course, you have anxiety that comes along with that. You have depression that comes along with that and maybe even episodes of anger. Those are the main things that I do help my truckers with.
.
Clay: Yeah, that’s kind of universal problems but specific to that industry. Just myself, do they talk about much about road rage?
Buck: Yeah and with road rage ironically, it is more about dealing with the four wheelers and that’s trucker slang for cars.
Clay: Okay.
Buck: I know that I’m really a trucker therapist because I said that without thinking about it. Anyway, it’s usually the rage is thrown more at the truck driver than it is the truck driver having the rage against the other cars or trucks on the road. Every once in a while, I do talk with the driver that they are a hothead themselves and that needs to be dealt with, but usually these guys and gals, they are more of the target because they are the biggest thing on the road and there’s all these lawyers that they specialize in suing truck drivers and getting into accidents and all this. It’s helping to manage that.
Clay: Yeah, okay because I can’t think of any industry where, and I’ve always thought of truckers as professional, highly trained people in a dangerous job. In their industry, they have to interact with people that are not, like in their workplace, the highway, they are interacting with people who are not trained and could present them in a dangerous situation. That’s got to be very frustrating.
Buck: Oh, it definitely is, yes, and there are truck drivers that they will say that the trucking schools are not hard enough that there isn’t enough education out there, and then you have truck drivers who are going out on the road with not enough experience. That’s a whole another discussion. That’s a whole another concern and maybe some of the anger issues that I will help truck drivers with would be maybe they have been out on the road for a long time, they are well into their profession and they are trying to deal with these new drivers and how do they continue to be professional with them, how do they continue to keep a cool level head with them. That comes up on a regular basis as well as just simply truck driver image because I can think of a few clients that I have just talk about how turned off they are because there are so many truck drivers who do not have a professional image. Maybe their dress is sloppy, their hygiene isn’t as good, and they care about trucking so it becomes this real hot platform for them. I’m on the phone talking with them and trying to let them mellow out about this a little bit.
Clay: Sure. I would think, and again, this is just from personal experience, trying to find, just looking at the lifestyle of being in a truck for that many hours, being away from your family, and trying to find nutritious food along the road and to stay in shape. I’ve read about a lot of truckers having back problems because you’re sitting all day and sometimes you’re loading and unloading things, I suppose, so you’re not getting a lot of physical exercise and you’re not eating well. Do they talk much about that?
Buck: Oh yeah. That comes up on a regular basis. When I do an intake session with a new client, I ask them, “How are you doing as far as your diet? How are you doing as far as your exercise?” Many of them, they already know that they need to work on it and some of them are so proud that they have a refrigerator in their truck and they do the best that they can to eat healthy. Sometimes, I do get people who don’t realize that the diet is a problem and they don’t understand that mind-body connection. I often spend a good bit of time talking about that mind-body connection and just educating the client on how that works and what they can do to make that better.
Clay: Yeah. Do they talk much about the isolation?
Buck: I would think so, yeah. That comes up on a regular basis and sometimes, we will even do a conference call, like a couple’s therapy session on the phone. I remember when I very first started doing that, I had to have a pen and paper and take notes and trying to keep it all straight. I’ve trained myself well enough that I’m pretty relaxed about it, but it does take more of my brain power to do that and I find these conference calls to be quite helpful.
Clay: Yeah. Because I’m doing the couple’s counseling online, it is a completely different animal than doing one on one counseling because you’re juggling two different personalities who have sometimes divergent goals and different opinions, and a lot of heat and a lot of emotion going on. It is exhausting a bit.
Buck: It can be, yes. One of the things that I really like about it is when I have my couples on the phone and one is talking to the other and they are not going through me because they often like to pose the question to me or pose the comment to me and have me be the moderator, I like it when they are able to talk to one another and I can just listen and it feels like, okay, we have a good natural flow. This isn’t mechanical and it’s working for them. I find that to be rewarding.
Clay: Yeah. Okay, let’s switch a little bit. Because I’m talking to somebody who has a successful functioning private practice, tell me a little bit about some of the business end of it and you’re marketing some of the things that you have learned over the years that might be helpful to some of the listeners out there.
Buck: Well, as far as the marketing end of it goes, kind of like what we talked about earlier is that you want to get out and you want to be useful to the specific organizations in the field, definitely the idea of giving some things away for free, okay.
Clay: Okay.
Buck: For example, I’m a recurring guest on the Road Dog Channel which is the trucker channel on SiriusXM Satellite Radio. Just this morning, I was on there. Every two weeks, I’m on the Tim Ridley show and talking about different mental health subjects that come up. That’s something that I give away for free and it has definitely come back to me plenty of times. I write an article from time to time. It’s called Land Line Magazine. That’s like the big magazine for truckers. That’s another thing that I do. Those are the common marketing pieces and then the truck shows that I go to, that’s another common marketing piece. I do the truck shows a little bit different because people think of going to any kind of trade show as “here’s my booth, here’s my card” and all that kind of thing.
I will volunteer in other people’s booths and I won’t have my own. Yeah, you’re being helpful and you’re also getting your name out there. Now, I’ve got a Trucker Therapy shirt. My wife comes with me. She wears a shirt as well and you’re out there being real, helping the truck drivers talking with them. That’s another way to get some exposure and there’s a few different not for profit organizations in the trucking industry that I help out and you’re doing them a big favor by helping their booth out.
Clay: I have to ask, does your wife wear the Trucker Therapy t-shirt?
Buck: She does.
Clay: Okay. Well, you’re going to have to tell that to my wife because we just signed up for the Psychotherapy Networker Symposium in March. We’re going to be in Washington, DC promoting the podcast at there. It’s the first time I’ve ever gone to any kind of conference as a vendor. I said, “We could get t-shirts, honey and maybe a hat that says The Online Counselling Podcast,” and she was having none of it. She says she will help me in the booth, but no t-shirts or hats. What are you going to do?
Buck: Well, we’ll see if we can convert her.
Clay: Okay. How about advertising, anything with Google AdWords or maybe taking up ads in some of the industry magazines?
Buck: Well, I do this on a shoestring budget and it works quite well. The most extensive ad that I’ve thrown out there which has not been a whole lot of money, but for $50 a month, I had made friends with a trucking team, a man and wife, and I have a Trucker Therapy ad on the side of their truck. It’s nothing huge. It’s by the driver’s door and it’s probably something like a 24-inch square, something like that. That’s one thing that I’ve done. With the free exposure on the radio as well as in the magazine, I think that works quite well. I have thought about AdWords. I just haven’t done that and I’m pretty happy with the success that I’m getting as is. I’ll tell you what, when I get a referral from someone in the trucking industry, that often creates a much more quality referral compared to someone that just kind of sees your ad and they don’t really know anything about what you do. Most of my clients are quite primed and ready. That’s just how I work.
Clay: Yeah, okay. That’s helpful because I think that there is a common misconception that you have to spend a lot of money to advertise and market yourself, and there’s a lot of free things out there. Networking and building a brand recognition by just getting to know people is hugely important.
Buck: Yeah, it definitely is and when I very first started my private practice seven years ago as far as in my office, I thought that, okay, yeah, you do have to buy ads and all of this, and I got very little return on that. I got to tell you something, Clay. I am fascinated by putting my ads on big diesel vehicles. I’ve got this Trucker Therapy ad that I’ve told you about. When I opened my practice, I put more of a regular tone down ad just for traditional therapy on the back of one of the city buses here in town. No other therapists had done that and I’m in a town of 100,000, so it’s not that big. It got a lot of attention. It didn’t really seem to get that many referrals, but it has been like seven years later and I still hear people talking about it. It was an amazing brand awareness that I did. It was not a whole lot of money and I was really happy with it. I’m really glad that I did it. Anyway, just a thought.
Clay: That’s fun, okay. I’ll think about that. Just on your side, tell me about the trucker therapy news letter. Is that something that you do?
Buck: Yes. You’re probably referring to…
Clay: Trucker therapy News.
Buck: Yes. I use this service called the Paper.li and what that is, it’s completely automated and it goes through your Twitter feed. You tell it what you want to be in your paper, so I’ve got all kinds of mental health keywords, and it actually brings this into a digest on a daily basis and makes this newsletter for you. It’s a fantastic service that you don’t have to put a whole lot of work into. There’s a lot of automation and I think it’s really neat.
Clay: Okay because I was looking at this and was immensely and still immensely impressed. This looks like a major publication like I’m on CNN, but it says Trucker Therapy News and it’s all these articles and videos and tips. I would think, how does he have time to do something like this? This is something that is kind of automated.
Buck: Yeah, it definitely is automated and in the beginning, I have to spend some time tweaking it and you can kind of teach it as far as “I don’t like this content. I do like that content” and you train it often like an email filter, something of that nature, and then you can get it to automatically do this for you and it works out quite nicely, so yeah. I even look at those newsletters myself in order to keep up with my Twitter field and learn more about my followers. It highlights three followers per day, so it helps to network and the people that are highlighted in that newsletter, they really enjoy that and it gives them exposure as well.
Clay: Wow. There are articles on gasoline and diesel prices and I thought, “How in the world is he getting all this together?” Now I know. For those of you, it’s Paper.li. I’m going to check it out because this looks really cool. So back to you, I want to be aware of your time. Any other tips, things that maybe people should be aware of the online counseling? Maybe you think there’s a therapist out there thinking I want to bring online counseling to my practice and expand. What would you say to him/her?
Buck: Well, I would say look at what you want to do and figure out what your niche is because as we all know that if you say that you just want to do online therapy, well, that’s not enough. We have to figure out the specifics. Don’t forget to use the telephone. That’s something that is overlooked quite a bit, a very good invention. Don’t forget that anything text based is okay as well. I do have a secure email system that I use with my clients and that works quite nicely. For the video conferencing, I do use the keywords Skype and FaceTime, but nonetheless, I use a secure system that is called regrouptherapy.com. It’s HIPAA compliant and you don’t have to worry about that piece.
People aren’t going to know what that is, but they do know what Skype and FaceTime, so I use that more as keywords to help people to understand. Just one last thing that I would say about someone that’s going into this field is that you do have to screen your clients. If someone appears that they have a serious mental illness that would need more thorough assistance that would be better dealt with face to face, you do need to do some screening there. If I have a client that it looks like they will be suicidal or they are suicidal, I’m not going to talk with them online. I want them to go in person and get the highest quality of help that they can. Sometimes, you just have to be face to face and again, it depends on what the client is comfortable with. That’s what I would throw out there.
Clay: Okay, those are really good. I want to back up if you have time because I don’t always go into this with guests because are uncomfortable. The laws are changing, HIPAA issues whether you’re using Skype or FaceTime, and I like, you do the same thing that I do. I advertise as Skype, as FaceTime as a brand recognition. That’s what people are looking for, kind of like Band-Aid. Nobody looks for bandages, they look for Band-Aid, which is the brand name. You do that as well, however, to be compliant ethically, you are using a HIPAA compliant platform.
Buck: Yes.
Clay: Okay. What are some of your thoughts around that? Some people don’t care one way or the other with Skype. What was your evolution on using that platform?
Buck: Well, I think that my conscience would get to me if I didn’t use something that I knew was approved and in the very beginning, I did use Skype and it wasn’t as big of a deal back then and there wasn’t really any concern. As time went on, there was more and more concern about this. If you look at the liability side of it, there’s discussion about how Skype doesn’t have an audit trail and all these kind of things, so I’m thinking worst case scenario, if I get sued then I can say, “Look, I’m using regrouptherapy.com. It is official. It is HIPAA compliant and I don’t have to worry about it. The other way if I ‘m using FaceTime of Skype then I would have to try to say, “Okay, well, here’s why I think that it’s alright,” and then when the judge asks you about HIPAA compliance and so on, I’d have to say, “No, it’s not,” and there would be a lot of explaining to do. I don’t know. I’m more cautious in that area and I know that other people have different opinions there.
Clay: I think it’s smart and you’re really the first person that talked about using the brand names of Skype and FaceTime to get people in the door and help them at least to understand what this is and as good as regrouptherapy.com, this is the first time I’m hearing of them. You get them in the door and then this is how we’re going to do it and yeah, it’s just smart, I think.
Buck: Yeah and I just wish that they would make Skype and FaceTime HIPAA compliant and then it would be easier for everyone involved. Unfortunately, that’s not the case.
Clay: Unfortunately at this time. Maybe they will listen to this podcast in a year and go, “Wow, how things have changed.”
Buck: Exactly. I hope so, Clay.
Clay: Well Buck, I can’t thank you enough. I have looked forward to this for the longest time and really getting to know somebody that I have followed for a long time. I appreciate you spending time with us and thank you very much.
Buck: Alright, Clay. Thank you so much for having me.
Clay: If you want to learn more about his practice, it’s truckertherapy.com. Reach out to him, learn more about what’s going on. He’s got a great blog there and obviously, this great newsletter. If you want to learn more about us, we’re on Twitter, @oncounselling, and Facebook at the onlinecounselling.com. Leave us a comment, rate us, and review. We want to hear from you. Hope to hear from you and tune in for the next time. Thanks.
[0:43:45]
End of podcast