FEI President Ted Uczen Quoted in BizTimes Magazine

An employee with personal financial problems spends an average of 20 work hours per month dealing with them, according to Personal Finance Employee Education Foundation, a financial literacy nonprofit organization. And according to the Center for Responsible Lending, more than 50 percent of Americans live paycheck-to-paycheck, with no savings set aside for emergencies.


FEI Behavioral Health, an employee assistance program (EAP), wellness and crisis management provider based in Milwaukee, is helping employers address these problems with a new financial wellness program launched in August. The service is administered as an employee benefit through a partnership with Emerge Workplace Solutions.


Personal financial emergencies can lead employees to take out payday loans that provide quick cash but often charge up to 400 percent in long-term interest. These rates can encourage a repetitive churning effect, in which an individual has to take out another loan to recover from paying back the last one, said Ted Uczen, president of FEI.