Mental health support for the people behind the plan

Because the work is heavy and the workforce is stretched thin. In a 2025 HSU survey of almost 500 Australian disability support workers, 62% reported frequent or constant burnout, 91% had at least thought about leaving the profession, and 55% had considered leaving in the past year. Nearly half said they often or always lack enough staff for safe, quality care. That kind of pressure does not stay at work, and it is a big part of why turnover in the sector reached 24% for casual staff and 16% for permanent staff, the highest permanent turnover since the census began. An EAP gives your people a private, professional place to offload before that pressure tips into burnout or a resignation.

It protects the things that keep your service running: continuity for participants, a stable roster and your registration standing. When a worker burns out and leaves, you lose hard-won knowledge of a participant's needs and you wear the cost of replacing them. Onboarding to replace staff who leave costs the disability and allied health sector between $80 and $190 million a year. By giving your team fast, high-quality support before things reach crisis, you keep experienced people on the floor, reduce avoidable turnover and show participants and their families the consistency they rely on.

Confidentiality is what makes people feel safe enough to reach out, so it is built into everything. What a worker discusses with their counsellor stays between them and the clinician. As the employer you never see who booked a session or what was raised, only anonymous, aggregate reporting on how the service is being used and where pressure is building. The single exception is a serious risk to someone's safety, which clinicians are legally required to act on. That privacy is exactly why workers use the service, and your reporting still gives you the insight to manage psychosocial risk across the team.

Yes, and that is the point. Three out of four NDIS workers are part-time or casual, often juggling shifts across more than one provider, so anything that needs a GP referral or office-hours appointment simply does not get used. With Talked there is no waitlist and no clinic visit. Your people get a simple link or code, book in a few minutes, choose a counsellor and connect by phone, video or message at a time that works, including outside standard hours. Support that is easy to reach is support that gets used.

You get clear, confidential reporting that never identifies an individual. That includes how many of your people are using the service, broad themes coming through such as stress, sleep, grief or burnout, and where psychosocial risk looks highest across teams or sites. Over time you can see uptake climb and connect it to what matters to your organisation, like lower turnover, fewer unplanned absences and steadier rosters. It gives your leaders something concrete to act on and a record that you are meeting your duty of care.

You choose the plan and Talked tailors the number of sessions to suit your team and budget. Most plans include a set number of free sessions per worker each year, which is enough to work through the issues that come up in support work, from a tough shift to ongoing stress at home. If someone needs longer-term or more specialised care, their counsellor helps them find the right next step. Talk to us and we will size a plan to your workforce, whether that is a single home or a team spread across the state.