Legal

Safeguarding Policy

Version 1.0 · 11 June 2026 · TheirCall Ltd, Company No. SC887444

TheirCall provides daily AI companionship calls to elderly people — a group that includes adults who may be vulnerable. This policy explains plainly what we do when a call gives rise to a concern about someone's safety or wellbeing, what we deliberately do not do, and why. It should be read alongside our Service Disclaimer and Limitation of Liability, which states the limits of what TheirCall can promise.

1. Our position in one paragraph

TheirCall is a wellbeing companion service, not a safeguarding body, care provider, or emergency service. When a call raises a concern, our role is to tell the family — promptly, clearly, and calmly. The family are the responsible party for their relative's care and safety, and any decision to involve professional, social, or emergency services is theirs. TheirCall does not contact the authorities on a relative's behalf.

2. The legal framework we operate within

TheirCall Ltd is a Scottish company providing a UK-wide service. Scotland has its own adult protection legislation — the Adult Support and Protection (Scotland) Act 2007 — and the other UK nations have their own frameworks. TheirCall is a private company, not a public body, and does not carry statutory safeguarding duties under the 2007 Act or its equivalents.

We reference the Act here because its underlying principles — that adults at risk deserve protection, and that concerns should reach the people able to act on them quickly — inform how this policy is designed, even though the Act's formal duties do not apply to us.

3. What happens when a call raises a concern

If, during a call, your relative says something that suggests they are in distress, in danger, being harmed or neglected, or facing a crisis:

• The AI raises an alert immediately, during the call itself.
• The call is brought to a warm, unhurried close. Your relative is never interrogated, alarmed, or left mid-conversation.
• You are notified without delay, by email and text message. The alert is always accompanied by the full summary of the call, whatever your subscription tier, so you can see for yourself what was said and judge the situation with full context.

Concerns that emerge after a call, when the conversation is reviewed to write your summary, are also brought to your attention promptly in the same calm, plain-English manner.

Alerts are deliberately written in calm, uniform language. We tell you what was said and leave the judgement of its seriousness to you — the person who knows your relative.

4. What we deliberately do not do

We do not filter, soften, or withhold what your relative says. Summaries report the conversation faithfully and neutrally, in reported speech — including statements that may be confused, mistaken, or uncomfortable to read. We made this choice deliberately, for a reason worth stating plainly: an AI cannot reliably tell a true disclosure from an identical confused one, and an out-of-character or confused statement is often exactly the early signal a family most needs to see. A service that quietly filtered "unlikely" concerns would suppress the very information you subscribed to receive. Your relative gives informed consent, before the service begins, to their conversations being summarised for you — they are speaking in the knowledge that you will hear about it.

We do not contact emergency services, social services, the police, or any other authority. Escalation runs through you, always. This is not an oversight; it reflects what TheirCall is. We hold a few minutes of conversation a day — you hold the relationship, the history, and the judgement. A decision as serious as involving the authorities belongs with you, not with an AI service.

We do not promise to detect anything. As our Service Disclaimer explains, TheirCall tries, on a best-effort basis, to notice and flag signs of concern. It cannot and does not guarantee to catch any particular thing, and the absence of an alert is never an assurance that all is well. Keep up your own regular contact with your relative.

5. Consent, capacity, and vulnerability

TheirCall is designed for relatives who can hold a daily conversation — and who can therefore give their own consent. Before the daily service begins, we obtain two consents directly and verbally from your relative on an introductory call: consent to receive the calls, and consent for summaries to be shared with you. A family member cannot consent on their behalf.

If your relative withdraws consent at any point, the calls stop immediately and you are notified.

If you have concerns about your relative's capacity to give their own consent — for example, early dementia — contact us at hello@theircall.co.uk before subscribing. We handle these situations individually and carefully, and where a relative's capacity to consent is genuinely in doubt, we will err on the side of not providing the service.

6. If you are worried right now

If you believe your relative is in immediate danger or needs urgent help, call 999. Do not wait for a TheirCall call, summary, or alert. For non-emergency concerns about an adult at risk, your local council's adult social care team (or, in Scotland, the local adult protection contact) can advise — and your own phone call to your relative remains the fastest check of all.

7. Reviewing this policy

This policy is version-controlled. The version number and date at the top always reflect the current edition, and previous editions are archived and remain available. Questions about this policy can be sent to hello@theircall.co.uk.

Version history

v1.0 — 11 June 2026 — First published version.