The right time to judge an EAP is before you sign, not a year in. Our Commercial Director, Brandon Collins, breaks down what actually predicts EAP usage. Worth a read.
Most employee assistance programmes are hastily bought and then judged, much later, on whether anyone used them. By then the contract has long been signed and the budget is spent.
The better approach is to work out up front which things are the most important to people, because that is what separates an EAP that earns its keep from one that sits in an induction pack.
So if you’re working out how to choose an EAP provider, the question is a simple one. Will your people actually use it?
These are the criteria that tell you, before you commit, whether they will.
Whether someone can easily reach help
The single biggest predictor of usage is how little stands between a worried person and a real conversation. If reaching support means office hours, one phone number and a wait, most people give up before they start. Look for round-the-clock access, so someone can reach a real person at 2am or book a session when it suits them, not just during office hours. No waiting lists, and a same-day route when something is urgent.
The easier it is to reach, the more it gets used, and the sooner people ask for help, which is when it works best.
Whether they reach a real person
People can tell within seconds whether they are talking to someone who can help or are being routed through a script. An EAP that answers a first call with a chatbot, or pushes everyone towards self-help articles, trains people not to bother again. The providers that hold onto usage are the ones where a qualified counsellor picks up, listens and stays with the problem. That way, self-help resources earn their place as a backup or for quick answers, but they cannot be the front door.
Whether the support fits their real life
People struggle with a range of issues. They worry about money, a tenancy dispute, a parent who needs care, a teenager who is not coping. An EAP that covers counselling alongside legal guidance, debt and money help and support for the whole household gets used far more, because it is relevant to far more of what people are actually carrying. Cover for dependants and immediate family widens that again, and it is often a partner or a child who needs the help first.
Whether the provider helps you launch it
An EAP can have everything right on paper and still get used by nobody, if nobody remembers it exists. People reach for support when they already know it is there, trust it and can find it in the moment they need it. So ask what a provider does after go-live. Do they help you promote the service, train your managers to point people towards it and keep it visible through the year, or do they hand over a poster and a phone number and leave you to it? That ongoing promotion is the difference between an EAP almost nobody touches and one that becomes part of how people cope.
Whether you can see what is happening
You can only improve usage you can measure. Good providers give you clear, anonymised reporting on how many people are using the service, for what and to what effect, with individual confidentiality protected throughout. That tells you whether your launch worked, where to push next and what to put in front of your board at renewal. A provider who cannot or will not report on usage is asking you to take its value on trust.
Whether people trust it enough to use it
Usage rests on trust, and trust rests on credibility and confidentiality. Check that counsellors are registered with recognised professional bodies, that the provider holds proper clinical governance and accreditation, and that the service is confidential and GDPR-compliant, with only aggregated data ever shared back to you. People open up when they are certain it is safe to, and they can sense the difference between a service held to a clinical standard and one run like a call centre.
Where HealthHero fits into this
We built our Employee Assistance Programme around these exact criteria because usage is the measure we care about most. People reach a qualified clinician by phone or video, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Live chat and email are coming later this year, adding two more ways to reach support.
Anyone who calls in crisis is connected to a clinician straight away. The support spans counselling, online CBT, legal and financial guidance and money and debt help, with cover for dependants and immediate family too, so it is relevant to whatever someone is dealing with.
Behind it sits a UK-wide network of over 1,000 vetted clinicians, including more than 100 trained critical incident responders and other specialised psychological practitioners, registered with the BACP, BPS, UKCP, HCPC or COSCA. More than 70,000 UK organisations rely on it, from Sainsbury's and British Airways to small businesses. For organisations with employees based overseas, we can extend EAP support internationally through culturally aligned therapy delivered in the local language. We help you launch and embed it from day one, with clear reporting throughout, rather than leaving you with a phone number and hoping for the best.
If you want to see what an EAP built to be used looks like in practice, take a look at our employee assistance programme.
