If you are an HR lead or a founder comparing employee assistance programme providers, you will find that the sales pages sound alike. Most promise confidential counselling, a helpline and happier teams. The differences sit in the details, and the details are easier to find if you go in with a list of questions.
This is that list. Ask each provider the same questions, write the answers down, and compare them side by side. If you want to know what an EAP is first, our article on employee assistance programmes in India covers it, and we will not repeat it here.
1. Who are the counsellors, and how are they reviewed?
Counselling is only as good as the person in the room. Ask who will actually see your employees: their qualifications, their experience, and whether they work for the provider or are independent practitioners listed on a platform.
Then ask how a counsellor gets onto the list and who checks them. A good answer names a process and a person or team responsible. Be careful with a bare claim of "vetted" that cannot be explained. Ask whether employees can see a counsellor's credentials before they book, and what happens when an employee wants a different counsellor.
2. Which languages and cities?
A team in Pune that speaks Marathi and Hindi at home will not use a service that only runs in English. List the languages your people are comfortable in and the cities or towns where they work, including remote staff. Ask the provider to confirm each, not to say "pan India" in general.
Ask how languages are matched: can an employee choose a counsellor by language, or are they assigned one?
3. Online, in person, or both?
Online sessions suit distributed teams and people who want privacy from colleagues. Some people prefer to sit in a room with a counsellor, and a factory floor or a branch office may need that. Ask which formats are offered, in which cities, and whether in-person options are real or only listed.
Also ask how a session is booked and how long it takes to get a first slot. A service that is hard to book goes unused, whatever it costs.
4. Confidentiality: what does the employer see?
This is the question that decides whether employees trust the service. Ask exactly what the employer receives. Some providers share anonymised summaries. Some share nothing beyond a bill. Ask for the answer in writing, and ask whether any names, team names or session topics can ever reach you.
Then ask about the exceptions. Most providers describe situations, such as a risk to someone's life, where confidentiality may be set aside. Read that wording yourself. A small team with only a few users can also make an anonymised report easy to guess, so ask how the provider protects against that.
5. How does billing work?
There are two common models. One charges per head, a fixed amount for every employee covered, whether or not anyone uses the service. The other charges for what is used: per session taken or per workshop run. Per head makes your cost predictable. Pay for use usually costs less when few people use the service, and more when many do.
Ask which model the provider uses, what is included in the fee, and whether there are minimum commitments, set-up charges or extra fees for workshops. Ask for a sample invoice. Ask what happens to unused sessions at the end of a term.
6. Workshops, POSH, manager training and incident support
Counselling is one piece. Ask what else the provider can run for your team, and whether it is included or billed separately: wellness talks and workshops, POSH awareness training, an external member for your Internal Committee, and training for people managers on how to support someone through a hard period.
Also ask about critical incident support. If a colleague dies or a serious accident happens at work, who can send a counsellor to the affected team, and how quickly is it arranged? Ask who delivers each of these, and whether that person is trained for it. Check with your legal adviser what applies to your organization under the POSH Act.
7. What are the crisis routes?
Ask what happens when an employee is in acute distress. Is there a helpline, is it staffed at night and on weekends, and who answers? Ask the provider to be honest about what it does and does not cover. A counselling service is not an emergency service.
Whatever you choose, tell your people about Tele MANAS, the national helpline, on 14416. It is there for anyone, at any time, and it does not depend on your provider.
8. Contract and exit
Ask for the contract before you decide, not after. Look at the term, the notice period, the renewal terms and any minimum spend. Ask what happens to your employees' access if you leave, and whether you can end the arrangement without a penalty.
Ask who owns any data about your organization and how it is handled when the contract ends. A provider that is confident in its service has no reason to make leaving hard.
9. Run a small pilot first
You do not have to commit for a whole workforce on day one. Ask each shortlisted provider whether you can start with a small group, one team, one office or one workshop, for a fixed period of a few months.
Agree in advance what you will look at: how easy it was to book, how people found the sessions, and whether managers felt better equipped. Ask your pilot group for feedback without asking them to reveal that they used counselling. Then decide whether to widen it.
EAP and employee counselling providers in India
Two names come up often when Indian employers search for an EAP. The details below are what each says on its own website, as listed in October 2026. Ask each for a quote and its contract terms, since neither price nor term was listed on the pages we read.
1to1help describes itself as a full EAP provider offering confidential counselling, crisis care and digital tools for employees. It says it has 450 expert counsellors, support in 13+ languages and a clinically governed approach backed by a NIMHANS-validated protocol, and lists a crisis helpline open 24x7. For employers it describes aggregated, anonymised HR reports and dashboards, and workshops that help managers recognise and refer people who need support. Its EAP page lists POSH training as on-demand video courses. It says pricing depends on your organisation's size and programme. 1to1help may suit a larger employer that wants one provider for a helpline, crisis care, counselling in many languages and regular reports to HR.
MantraCare describes a wide wellness platform for employers and individuals. Its employer programmes include an EAP covering mental health, mindfulness and yoga, financial wellbeing and life coaching, plus wellness and specialised care such as nutrition, fitness, physiotherapy and diabetes care. It says it has 12,000+ vetted providers across 30+ countries, support in 20+ languages, sessions by chat, voice or video, and crisis support 24/7 through in-app chat. Its employer page offers a free trial requested by employee count. MantraCare may suit an employer that wants one app and vendor for mental and physical health.
Put the questions above to each of them, and to any other provider on your list, in the same words.
Where Leshya fits
We make Leshya, so weigh this accordingly. Leshya is an alternative to an EAP, not one. We do not sell a packaged programme for every head. We arrange employee counselling, workshops, manager training and counsellor support after a distressing event, and we agree the scope and fees with you first.
In terms of the checklist above: sessions are one to one with counsellors on Leshya who tell us they take on organization work, online or in person depending on what the counsellor offers. A person reviews every counsellor profile before it goes live. Billing is per session taken or workshop run, not per head. You see usage, never names, and individual counselling stays between the person and their counsellor. A person reads your inquiry, a short call follows, and scope and fees are agreed before anything starts.
Leshya has no helpline and no employer dashboard of its own, and we do not claim the scale of the providers above. If those are what your leadership wants, an EAP provider is built for that. Leshya may suit a smaller or growing team that wants counselling, a workshop or manager training arranged with a clear fee, without committing to a full programme.
Every Leshya page and counsellor website follows WCAG 2.1 AA practices, so employees who are blind or have low vision can browse and book with a screen reader.
If you're thinking about harming yourself, please talk to someone right now. Tele MANAS is free, confidential and always open: call 14416. You matter.
The counselors here can help with ongoing support, but right now a call is faster.
Common questions
Ask who the counsellors are and how they are reviewed, which languages and cities are covered, what the employer sees, how billing works, what else is offered beyond counselling, how crisis cases are handled, and what the contract says about exit.
