Safety Planning Tool
Our safety planning tool will help you work out and securely save a plan you can use anytime you need it.
Your online plan will be completely anonymous, password protected and totally private.
After you submit your plan, you will be given a unique number. You will need to remember this number (along with your password) to log into your plan again.
What is a Safety Planning Tool?
A safety plan is a tool primarily designed to provide practical support to people currently affected by sexual, family and intimate partner violence (SFIPV).
This safety planning tool is designed to help you and/or your client to start thinking about personal safety and the safety of dependants (such as pets, kids and other dependant or vulnerable loved ones).
It will help you to identify the things you/your client already do to be safe and build on these strategies, as well as prompting you to think about actions that could be taken to improve safety into the future. For those affected by SFIPV it is always useful to think about safety, whether the plan is to stay, leave or return to the relationship/s in question.
How to Use This Tool
Professionals are encouraged to use this plan with their LGBTQ+ client experiencing SFIPV by asking the client to answer the questions below in their own voice.
Examples of how you might ask your client(s) these questions are included below each question. Note that these are merely to assist and provide ideas, but each individual should answer in the way that seems most accurate for them.
If you are the person experiencing SFIPV, you can use this tool to develop a safety plan by yourself, with a support person or a service provider (e.g., counsellor, psychiatrist).
You do not need to answer all questions or complete it in one go for it to be useful. It is intended to be a tool you can develop and work on over time.
This safety planning tool asks you to enter information into an online form, by asking you a series of questions. You do not need to answer each question to continue.
Things to Keep in Mind
- You can revisit this tool as many times as you need – you/your client’s skills, needs, assets and circumstances will change, so think of this as an evolving document that you can build on as you need.
- You can use this tool to upskill support people, such as friends, family, community members or colleagues.
- The clearer and more accurate information you provide, the more useful the tool will be.
- There are no right or wrong answers and you do not have to answer all of the questions for the tool to be useful.
It can be confronting to engage in safety planning. Note that you/your client may experience a stress response. Being aware of this can help you to anticipate and manage the impact it may have.
WARNING!
If you are completing this plan for yourself (not as a professional for a client), you need to be sure that the computer you are using is in a safe location and is not being monitored by anyone you wouldn’t want having access to this information.
We live in a digital age, and electronic surveillance is a common factor for people experiencing SFIPV. Click here for more information on identifying and responding to electronic surveillance.
If you are using a computer at school or work, remember that the information you enter may be able to be monitored by your school or employer.
If it does not feel comfortable or safe for you to enter information into the computer, you can still read through the questions and think about your answers. Alternatively, you can download the questions to answer offline, or print the plan off and fill in the hard copy.