Employee Assistance Programs

[Guest Pat Cromwell]

I am VP of HR for a samll community bank with offices in 5 different counties across the State. We are considering offering some type of employee assistance program(i.e., acces to legal advice, psychiatric counseling, substance abuse counseling, etc.)I am interested in information anyone can provide along this area --do you have one?how does it work? provider information, do employees use it and appreciate the benefit? etc. Thank you.

[Guest Patricia Ibbs]

My company offers an EAP. They thought about discontinuing it at one time and the employees petitioned to keep it. It is very popular.

Each employee unit can call and schedule up to three visits a year at no cost. Further visits have a nominal cost, but most often the problems are outsourced to financial consultants, counsellors, inpatient substance abuse centers, etc. All employee or dependent contacts are confidential; the employer receives a list of number of calls, problems identified, etc., but no employee names are attached.

Not only do the employees like the benefits, but it also has been wonderful for managers to refer troubled employees rather than taking time during the workday to listen to problems.

The program is essentially crisis management and works well.

[Guest [Pat M]]

I've used both local and national EAPs and also legal services plans and find that employees felt they were well worth the money. You may want to discuss these services with your local broker, if you have one. For example, Lawphone may be better in OH than a local provider of similar legal programs because they toss in financial/tax help, too. You'll be able to get help with the appropriate cost to the employee for such a service. Expect pretty low usage the first year, if you charge $x per month to sign up. But I saw an increase in the employees signing up for the plan in Y2 once the word spread about the services. For links and more info, visit www.nrccls.org/Plans/index.html

For EAPs in OH, search www.eap-sap.com/eap/local.htm the national list is www.eap-sap.com/eap/local.htm

I'm partial to: http://www.ceridianperformance.com/serv.shtml