Case library / What happens after discipline
Seven years on probation and counting
In short
Seven years on probation and counting?
Probation extended in each case, by twelve to eighteen months
$3,432Three extension cases, and what an extension actually means.
What happened
One licensee's probation was extended by eighteen months, with $3,432 of cost recovery from the original order still unpaid.
A second was extended by eighteen months with $4,040 in cost recovery outstanding.
A third was extended by one year. That probation began with a case filed in 2018 — by the extension, seven years under Board supervision, and still running.
A separate order in this group recites that cost-recovery obligations “remain in effect whether or not probation is tolled.”
What it was charged as
Extension rather than revocation is the Board's usual first response to a violation, and it resets nothing.
The outcome
Probation extended in each case, by twelve to eighteen months.
$3,432ordered in cost recovery under B&P §125.3 — and $4,040 outstanding in two of the three.What the rule actually says
Probation is tolled when you are not practicing, which sounds protective and is not: the clock stops, the obligations continue, and the end date moves. Combined with extensions, a five-year probation routinely becomes seven or eight years of quarterly reports, employer notifications, client notifications and monitoring fees.
Where insurance reaches, and where it does not
There is nothing to insure here and that is the point. The most expensive part of a disciplinary case is the years afterwards, and it falls entirely outside every policy sold to therapists.
What would have changed it
- When you model the cost of a disciplinary matter, model the probation, not the hearing. Monitoring at roughly $1,200 a year over seven years, plus ordered coursework that does not count toward your continuing education, plus the professional cost of telling every employer and every client.
Source. This write-up is drawn from the signed public decision in the case number above. Names, cities and employers have been removed — why. To pull the original, open the Board's quarterly newsletter archive, find the issue covering April 4, 2024, and match the case number in the Formal Disciplinary Actions section. Not legal advice.
