Telephone counselling can provide a lifeline to employees with problems at work or in their home life. These can affect performance and motivation in the workplace and can lead to absenteeism and threaten general health and wellbeing. Even trivial issues can be distracting and destructive, but talking in confidence with a trained specialist can bring a sense of proportion to the source of stress and anxiety and allow the person concerned to find their own approach to a solution.

Focus EAP has been providing telephone counselling for organisations since the 1980s and currently around 300,000 employees have immediate access to this service.

The service is enhanced by offering an interpretation facility for the callers preferred language.

Our Helplines can be open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year or fewer hours if our clients so choose, providing expertise in two specific areas:

Telephone counselling: Our experienced counsellors offer expert professional advice and support on a huge range of issues including stress and family relationships, legal, debt, harassment, consumer issues.

Information specialists: Frequently, practical information may be all that is required to extricate someone from what they see as an insurmountable difficulty. As well as having extensive knowledge on a wide variety of potential issues, our information specialists also have access to a range of comprehensive database resources such as the Citizen’s Advice Bureau, allowing them to provide effective solutions to the most challenging demands.

A telephone helpline can be an invaluable approach if face-to-face contact is not possible or unwanted, or it may lead to a meeting with an advisor if this is appropriate. It can support HR teams and managers by offering a counselling and advisory service to employees as well as providing useful statistical information and reporting to highlight issues that may impact on their duty of care obligations. The service can also be extended to members of the employee’s family if appropriate.

Telephone counselling can be employed as part of an Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) or as a standalone service.

The service can also be accessed via minicom, typetalk and e-mail.