What Is an EAP (Employee Assistance Program)? How Private Is It?

An EAP is a free benefit that helps employees address issues that affect their work performance and personal well-being. An EAP primarily focuses on providing mental health help, but many also provide services and tools that can help you solve practical, financial, legal, and social problems.

Employee assistance programs also sometimes help managers solve organizational challenges by providing managerial consultation and training. This helps managers learn how to effectively address the emotional and interpersonal issues their employees face. When necessary, managers may ask EAP staff to help employees cope with tragedies in the workplace or wider community.

The goal of any service an EAP offers is to make it easier for you, the employee, to get the help you need to be able to do your job well. Your employer hopes you will use the EAP to get help with a tricky issue that might otherwise cause you to perform poorly at work, miss days, or even have to quit entirely.

Providing an EAP costs your employer way less than having to hire and train new workers. It is, ultimately, self-serving for the company to have one, but not because they want or need to use it to spy on you. They just hope it will keep you happier and more productive than you might be without it.

The vast majority of EAP sessions are voluntary, confidential sessions employees seek out for themselves. The way EAPs help you address these issues is primarily through short-term counseling.

In rare cases, employers may refer you to an EAP to address a personal or performance issue at work. For example, your boss might refer you for “mandatory sessions” if you fail a random drug test.

However, there are tricky legal issues around whether employers can actually make you attend the EAP. In many cases, if they ask, it’s an easy choice to attend a free service that could save your job or repair your relationship with your boss. Ultimately, though, it’s up to you.

There are two main types of EAPs: on-site and off-site. (Some EAPs are a hybrid of these two types.)

In an on-site EAP, the counselors and other EAP staff are employees of your company. They have an office in one of your company buildings. 

In an off-site EAP, your employer contracts with outside professionals to provide EAP services. These professionals accept referrals from your company and provide EAP services from another location in the community. (In the case of mental health services, that location is usually a private practice office or a community mental health agency.)

Most companies use off-site EAPs. But in either case, the process of getting EAP services is usually pretty simple.

It’s important to know that in most cases, the services you get from an EAP will be completely free. There may be time limits to certain services—for example, you may only be allowed a 30-minute consult with a lawyer or a limited number of sessions with a counselor. But anything within the limits outlined in your EAP documents should be free. That’s just how EAPs are set up: they’re meant to be easy and relatively painless to use.

Most EAPs offer short-term therapy or counseling only. The number of sessions provided varies from EAP to EAP. Some offer as little as three sessions, while some offer as many as 8 to 12. Based on our research, the average number of EAP sessions seems to be about five.

It’s important to understand that in most cases, though, there is not a lifetime or even an annual limit on the number of sessions you get. The number of sessions allotted by an EAP is usually per issue.

For example, let’s say your EAP offers five sessions per issue, and you use five sessions to get help navigating a workplace conflict. If six months later, you need help with personal financial stress, you should be able to get another five sessions to address that.

In general, go into EAP counseling expecting your therapist to start asking questions that will help them hone in on the specific problem you want to solve. Then expect them to immediately start working with you to solve it. They will help you identify your goals, figure out your strengths, recall what’s helped you before in similar situations, and identify shifts in thinking or perspective that might help you come up with a solution—all while providing the emotional support you need to tackle this problem.

Concerns about confidentiality are a major reason many people hesitate to use EAP services. You probably aren’t comfortable with the idea of your boss or co-workers knowing the intimate details of your personal struggles, and you may feel suspicious about why your company even offers an EAP in the first place.

It can be confusing and stressful to try to figure out who can receive information about your sessions. You may worry your employer could take action against you if you admit to substance use, severe mental health issues, or other factors affecting your work during an EAP session. You may wonder if the therapist is truly working for you, the client. Anxiety around these issues may lead you to decide not to use your EAP at all.

This is a shame, because in most cases, this anxiety is unwarranted. Therapists working for EAPs are required to uphold the same standards of confidentiality and privacy as all other therapists. Providing services through an EAP doesn’t change the legal and ethical standards they must follow to maintain their license and uphold HIPAA law.

Employee assistance programs are set up to provide as much anonymity as possible. Your name is not filed or sent to your employer if you call the helpline or attend an EAP session.

Otherwise, any breach of confidentiality in an EAP would be incidental or accidental. For example, if your company uses an on-site EAP, there could be a risk of co-workers seeing you walk into the EAP office and gossiping about it.

And while EAPs do not send the names or employee numbers of EAP participants to executives or HR, they do send out utilization reports that indicate the location and job level of people who are using the EAP. This is done only to let management know how the service is being used and whether they might need to expand or reduce it at certain locations.

In large companies, it’s unlikely this would reveal your identity. However, in small companies, your location and job level might be enough for HR or managers to figure out who you are.

Still, even if they guess it’s you, they’re not supposed to do anything with that information. Laws like HIPAA and the Americans with Disabilities Act outline severe consequences for any employer that would try to use your use of EAP services against you.

And why would they?

One final exception to confidentiality in EAPs is if you are referred to one by a manager or HR in response to a disciplinary or performance issue. In this case, if you agree to attend EAP sessions to address the issue (it is actually quite tricky legally for your employer to require this of you), you may be asked to sign a release allowing the EAP counselor to confirm your attendance and progress to whomever referred you. In nearly every case, this does not authorize the counselor to disclose any details of what you share in your sessions—just to confirm you showed up.

Again, in the therapy world, disclosure of personal information is strictly regulated to protect your right to privacy. If a therapist violates your confidentiality, that is grounds for a complaint and could even lead to them losing their license.

Going to an EAP can be a great choice in many situations. You might be surprised at how many problems you can actually solve within the number of sessions you’re given. And when you can’t resolve an issue within those sessions, your EAP therapist can still help you assess your situation and give you a good referral.

In fact, one of your EAP counselor’s jobs is to quickly figure out whether they can help you within the allotted time or whether they need to refer you out. In many cases, they determine that they can help you. A few sessions may give you all the help you need to make an important decision, resolve a conflict, or overcome anxiety around a specific issue.

Another way to think about an EAP is that it gives you a safe place to explore an issue and see where you want to go with it next. It can be a way of dipping your toe into therapy if you’ve never tried it before and want to see what it’s all about. Given that the service is free, and that it renews annually (if not every time a new issue comes up in your life), there’s little risk in giving it a try.

Another potential perk of using an EAP is fast service. The turnaround time between requesting an appointment and getting one can be faster through an EAP than when you’re trying to find a private practice therapist on your own. So, it can be a great way to get immediate help to address an issue that needs your attention right away.

Whether you can continue seeing your EAP therapist on your own after you’ve used up your EAP sessions mostly depends on whether your company has an on-site or off-site EAP program. In most cases, with an off-site program (which most EAPs are), you should be able to keep seeing your therapist. The only issue would be figuring out whether that therapist accepts your insurance and, if not, whether you can afford their standard rate.

In an on-site program, your therapist is just as much an employee of your company as you are. The terms of their employment probably don’t allow them to provide anything other than EAP sessions or to accept direct pay from you. However, it’s always worth asking, as policies can vary from company to company. Many companies now have hybrid EAPs staffed by a mix of on-site and off-site staff and some counselors may be contractors that can continue seeing you off-site.

Employee assistance programs can help in a surprising number of situations. They can give you just the assistance you need to resolve a specific problem that’s come up at home or at work. They can help you develop an action plan and decide on next steps. And even when you need longer-term care, they can help you find a provider that’s right for you.

The services you get in an EAP are nearly always free. Your employer wants you to use the service to ensure you’re at your best at work. And therapists who work for EAPs must abide by the same confidentiality requirements as any other therapist.

If you know you want or need long-term therapy, and you can find a therapist in the community that you can afford to see, you may want to start there. Employee assistance programs are not a good place to look for long-term therapy for personal growth. Nor should you expect to completely resolve long-term or complicated mental health issues by going to an EAP. However, if you’re not completely sure what you need, an EAP counselor can help you figure that out, too.

In fact, most companies choose to offer them because they can improve a lot of employee outcomes for not a lot of money. Their purpose is to help you stay in your job and do well at it. The fringe benefit for you is that the way EAPs do that is by helping you improve your overall well-being.

So, if you need help with an issue that’s come up at work or home, we encourage you to call your EAP’s confidential 24/7 helpline or request a session through your company intranet. The help you need might be only a call or click away.

Note: The original version of this article was written by Eric Patterson. This version has been updated, edited, and expanded by Stephanie Hairston.