Substance Abuse Counselor Job Description Template

The exact credential and tier, in your state's own terms.

There is no national addiction-counselor credential, and the same letters mean different things in different places: "CADC" is a state certificate in Connecticut and a private certification in Illinois; "LCDC" is Texas's only SUD-counselor licence, but in Ohio LCDC is the second tier of a three-tier ladder (LCDC II → LCDC III → LICDC).

Write the issuing body next to the letters — "LCDC (Texas license)", "CASAC (OASAS credential)", "CADC certified by CCAPP (California)" — and name the tier.

Our CADC vs LADC vs LCDC vs CAC title map decodes any state's letters.

Never demand a licence title your state does not issue.

"Substance abuse counselor" is a job title, not one credential: the research behind this site's 51-jurisdiction credential pages classifies 33 jurisdictions as issuing a state SUD-counselor licence at one or more tiers (counting a state as a licence state when any counselor tier is a licence), 6 as issuing a state certificate or credential, and 12 states as private-certification-only, on the September 2026 research pass.

A posting requiring a state-licensed substance abuse counselor in a private-certification state such as California — where no state-issued SUD-counselor licence exists and counselors register or certify with one of three DHCS-approved organizations (CAADE, CADTP or CCAPP) for work in DHCS-licensed or certified programs — demands a licence the state does not issue (CCAPP's own advanced credential is styled a "non-governmental license" — a private credential despite the word "Licensed").

The map also still moves: West Virginia's first SUD-counselor licensure law took effect June 12, 2026, though the Bureau for Behavioral Health need not administer it until July 1, 2027.

Reserve protected titles for people who hold them.

Where the credential is protected, loose use has consequences: practising without the licence is a class B misdemeanor in Kansas (K.S.A.

65-6609), Texas protects LCDC practice under Occupations Code §504.151(a), and Minnesota's statute says flatly that no person shall engage in alcohol and drug counseling without first being licensed (Minn.

Stat.

148F.105).

State examples only — the protection and its strength differ everywhere, and some systems are narrower than they look: New York's CASAC governs work in OASAS-certified or funded settings, and Washington protects the SUDP title by statute (RCW 18.205.030) while issuing it as a certification, not a licence.

Match the listed duties to a tier your state's law actually trusts with them.

The entry tiers are supervised tiers, and diagnosis is the line that matters most.

In Louisiana, certified and registered addiction counselors may not render a diagnostic impression, and only the LAC may practise autonomously; Ohio reserves "diagnose and treat" for the LICDC, lets the LCDC III diagnose only under supervision, and says its LCDC II, LCDC III and CDCA "may not practice as an individual practitioner"; Texas rules state that LCDCs "are not qualified to treat individuals with a mental health disorder"; and Kentucky defines the practice of alcohol and drug counseling so that it does not include diagnosing or treating a mental health condition (KRS 309.080(11)(b)).

If the role carries diagnostic impressions, co-occurring caseloads or autonomous work, name the tier that can lawfully carry it — what a CADC can diagnose or bill walks through the scope rules.

If you accept trainee or intern tiers, write the supervision down.

Many states run a supervised trainee tier — a Texas Counselor Intern, a New York CASAC-Trainee (supervision only), a Minnesota ADC-T (an annually renewable permit, five renewals maximum) — and hiring one widens your pool but commits a senior clinician's time and limits what payers reimburse.

Program rules shape the arrangement: in Texas, an intern's hours count only after counselor-intern registration, and the supervisor must be on site until the first 2,000 supervised hours are logged.

Say who supervises, how often, whether supervision costs the candidate anything, and whether hours in this role count toward the next tier.

The pay model, with the overtime answer built in.

Many SUD counselors are hired at certificate, registered or bachelor's tiers that generally fail the learned-professional duties test for the FLSA overtime exemption, so treat those hires as non-exempt from the start: state the hourly rate and how overtime is handled.

A master's-level counselor you hire for independent clinical work falls under the same salary-basis rule as other therapists — to be exempt, at least $684 a week under the rules DOL restored in May 2026.

Either way, say how no-shows and documentation time are paid; those are the two places hourly models generate disputes.

Caseload, setting and the budget line.

Outpatient, intensive outpatient, residential or withdrawal management; the level of care your program operates at, if you place clients by level (a plain-English ASAM guide); the population and the group/individual mix; documentation expectations and EHR.

On pay, budget from BLS SOC 21-1018 and say so: the Bureau combines substance abuse, behavioral disorder and mental health counselors in one series — national median $59,350, middle 50 percent $47,100–$76,530, BLS OEWS May 2025, all industries — so a certificate-tier hire usually prices below the combined median and an experienced licensed-tier counselor above it.

Verify the credential with the issuer, and record the check.

Look it up in the issuing body's own directory — the state board, the state agency, or the named private board — not from a copy the candidate provides; accreditation standards treat a photocopy as insufficient (the Joint Commission's behavioral-health FAQ says presenting a copy of a licence in lieu of primary-source verification "does not meet the intent" of the requirement).

If the role touches federally paid programs, search the OIG exclusion list too: no statute or regulation requires you to run the check, but the law bans employing an excluded person in federally paid work, and OIG's guidance says monthly screening best minimizes the liability.

See hiring compliance: license verification and exclusion checks.

Start payer enrollment early — and know the Medicare gate.

The regulation itself (42 CFR 410.54(a), effective January 1, 2024) requires a qualifying master's or doctorate, at least 2 years or 3,000 hours of post-master's supervised clinical experience, and state licensure or certification as one of three titles — "a mental health counselor, clinical professional counselor, professional counselor."

It is CMS guidance — the CY2024 physician-fee-schedule preamble and CMS enrollment FAQs — that lets addiction counselors who meet all of those requirements enroll, and only as mental health counselors; CMS states that bachelor's-level certified counselors "would not meet the education requirements," so a certificate-tier hire cannot enroll at all.

If you plan to have a certificate-tier counselor's work billed incident-to, note who can bill that way: only a physician, clinical psychologist, nurse practitioner, clinical nurse specialist, physician assistant or nurse-midwife — so a counselor-led practice without one of those practitioners cannot use the incident-to route.

Put the supervision schedule and the records rules in writing in month one.

For trainee-tier hires, the written schedule is what makes their hours count toward their next tier and keeps the arrangement auditable.

And before the first note is written: substance use disorder patient records follow the federal confidentiality rule at 42 CFR Part 2, which is stricter than HIPAA in important ways — see our Part 2 explainer.

Out-of-state candidates: check portability before you post a multistate role.

IC&RC reciprocity runs only between member boards, only for the same credential at the reciprocal level, and the receiving board can add requirements — and the new jurisdiction sets the form: a counselor who moves into a licence state receives a licence, one who moves into a certification state a certification.

The credential must be current and valid.

There is no NAADAC-to-IC&RC credential reciprocity.

Our IC&RC vs NAADAC guide covers both systems, and the substance abuse counselor career guide maps the whole credential landscape.