EAPs: employee benefit or employer insurance?

Stress is not exactly new on the workplace agenda, but it’s hard to remember exactly how or when it arrived.

Many baby boomers, for example, will not have encountered stress as a term when they first started work in the late sixties or seventies, but will be very familiar with it now. Employers have been made more aware of their responsibilities for their employees’ overall health in the workplace and need tools, training and processes to fulfill these obligations properly.

Employee Assistance Programmes (EAP) enable employers to provide varying levels of cover to employees which match their needs and their budget. A variety of solutions delivered either online or by independent professionals on the phone or face to face put an EAP in reach of more organisations than ever before, at a time when the services are more necessary. Structuring an EAP into a wider voluntary benefits package gives employers real choice and flexibility in this aspect of benefits.

A very substantial majority of employers are taking measures to reduce stress at work¹, although it is important not to conflate people who are stressed at work with those who experience work- related stress. Measures which reduce the likelihood of stress at work includes things like facilitating flexible working, internal initiatives to focus on healthy eating and a healthier lifestyle, health screening and being more overt in acknowledging that most of us will face stressful times during our working lives and the employment relationship for both parties is best served by helping employees manage this, not expecting them to just grit their teeth and carry on.

The HSE published six management standards² against which employers should measure themselves to assess and mitigate stress in the workplace:

Demand: being able to cope with the demands of the job Control: having an adequate say over how work is done

Support: having adequate support from colleagues and superiors

Roles: understanding roles and responsibilities

Relationships: not being subjected to unacceptable behaviours

Change: being involved in any organisation changes.

So, in short, sound management practice is key to a healthy workplace. So if it is that obvious, why is an EAP “arguably, the benefits weapon of choice in the fight against workplace stress?”³.

EAPs come in a number of guises. The table below is not exhaustive as to the options available but it does show the scope of EAPs and illustrates the extent to which they can be used by employers and employees.

At the entry level, a phone line for employees to talk to an independent professional about problems is a real step to providing employees with an important, independent avenue of expertise and support. It is clear therefore that a full service EAP can be a powerful tool for line managers, and a fantastic safety valve for employees, helping to reduce absence and manage stressful situations at work, or non-work related stress which is impacting on job performance.

The annual cost of a typical EAP per employee is perhaps going to come in at around the cost of an hour’s work at an average wage, and much less for large employers who enjoy economies of scale, making a barely discernible dent in the pay and benefits budget. Even at the higher end of the service spectrum, it will be a very small dent.

An EAP is an employee benefit that, properly implemented and used, is also a significant direct and quantifiable benefit for employers.

¹IRS Stress Management Survey 2010
² HEALTH AND SAFETY EXECUTIVE. (2004) Management standards for work-related stress.
³ John Charlton writing in Personnel Today May 2010