In a previous post, we reported on an announcement by Delta Airlines that it would impose a premium surcharge on employees covered under its group health plan who failed to get vaccinated for COVID-19. This follow-on post...more
Massachusetts employers with 6 or more employees will soon be required to prepare and file a new health care reporting form referred to as the “healthcare coverage form.” While reminiscent of the now repealed “Health...more
1/17/2018
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Cost-Sharing ,
Employer Group Health Plans ,
Employer Mandates ,
Fair Share Contribution ,
Governor Baker ,
Health Insurance ,
Healthcare ,
Healthcare Reform ,
Local Ordinance ,
Popular ,
Reporting Requirements
With its “employer mandate”—i.e., the requirement that applicable large employers make an offer of group health coverage to substantially all full-time employees or face the prospect of a penalty—the Affordable Care Act (ACA)...more
6/15/2017
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Captive Insurance Company ,
Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) ,
Employer Group Health Plans ,
Employer Mandates ,
Health Insurance ,
IRS ,
Large Employer ,
Medical Stop-Loss Rules ,
MEWAs ,
Self-Funded Health Plans
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell recently gave a candid assessment of the chances of getting an Affordable Care Act (ACA) replacement bill through the Senate, saying “I don’t know how we get to 50 (votes) at the...more
6/8/2017
/ Affordable Care Act ,
American Health Care Act (AHCA) ,
Congressional Budget Office ,
Employer Mandates ,
Essential Health Benefits ,
Health Insurance ,
High Risk Pools ,
Individual Mandate ,
Legislative Agendas ,
Medicaid ,
Medicaid Expansion ,
Medicare ,
Proposed Legislation ,
Tax Credits ,
Trump Administration
On March 6, 2017, after years of promising, GOP lawmakers in the House of Representatives introduced the “American Health Care Act” (AHCA), the first concrete legislative proposal detailing the initial provisions designed to...more
3/22/2017
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Cadillac Tax ,
Congressional Budget Act of 1974 ,
Dependent Coverage ,
Employer Mandates ,
Flexible Spending Accounts ,
Health Insurance ,
Health Savings Accounts ,
Individual Mandate ,
Medicaid Expansion ,
Medical Device Tax ,
Medicare Part D ,
Minimum Essential Coverage ,
Over-the-Counter Sales ,
Premium Subsidies ,
Prescription Drugs ,
Proposed Legislation ,
Repeal ,
Small Business ,
Tax Credits
This week continues our survey of key Republican proposals to “repeal and replace” the Affordable Care Act (ACA). In the past two weeks, we have reviewed the Trump/Pence transition plan, entitled “Healthcare Reform to Make...more
When reporting offers of coverage to full-time employees under the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) employer shared responsibility rules, much of the detail appears in Part II of IRS Form 1095-C, Lines 14, 15 and 16. For the most...more
10/23/2015
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Employer Mandates ,
Full-Time Employees ,
Health Insurance ,
Hiring & Firing ,
IRS ,
Minimum Value Plans ,
New Hires ,
Part-Time Employees ,
Penalties ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Shared Responsibility Rule
Compliance with the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) employer shared responsibility rules requires that applicable large employers identify their full-time employees. A “full-time employee” for this purpose is an employee who...more
10/14/2015
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Disability Leave ,
Employer Mandates ,
Excise Tax ,
Full-Time Employees ,
Health Insurance ,
IRS ,
Large Employer ,
Penalties ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Safe Harbors ,
U.S. Treasury
This series is devoted principally to the reporting requirements imposed by Internal Revenue Code §§ 6055 and 6056 as added by §§ 1502 and 1514 of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), respectively. The former reports offers of...more
The Affordable Care Act’s reporting rules—which are set out in Internal Revenue Code §§ 6055 and 6056—solicit the information needed by the Internal Revenue Service to enforce the individual and employer shared responsibility...more
9/15/2015
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Employer Group Health Plans ,
Employer Mandates ,
Internal Revenue Code (IRC) ,
IRS ,
Large Employer ,
Look-Back Measurement Period ,
Minimum Essential Coverage ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Shared Responsibility Rule ,
Subsidies
Under a common strategy for controlling group health care plan costs, employers sometimes adopt arrangements under which an employee is offered cash as an incentive to waive coverage. These arrangements are colloquially...more
8/25/2015
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Cost-Sharing ,
Employer Group Health Plans ,
Employer Mandates ,
Final Rules ,
Flexible Spending Accounts ,
Form 1095 ,
Health Insurance ,
Health Insurance Exchanges ,
Incentives ,
Individual Mandate ,
Minimum Essential Coverage ,
Minimum Value Plans ,
Opt-Outs ,
Penalties ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Safe Harbors ,
Shared Responsibility Rule ,
Subsidies ,
Waivers
As we reported last week, the IRS recently issued draft 2015 Instructions for Forms 1094-C and 1095-C. These instructions are of interest to applicable large employers who must report their compliance with the Affordable Care...more
8/19/2015
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Employer Group Health Plans ,
Employer Mandates ,
Form 1094 ,
Form 1095 ,
Health Savings Accounts ,
HRA ,
IRS ,
Large Employer ,
Minimum Essential Coverage ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Section 6055 ,
Shared Responsibility Rule ,
Supplemental Insurance
The IRS recently issued draft 2015 Instructions for Forms 1094-C and 1095-C (“2015 Instructions”). These are the forms that employers with 50 or more full-time employees (including full-time equivalent employees) in the...more
8/11/2015
/ Affordable Care Act ,
COBRA ,
Employer Mandates ,
Filing Deadlines ,
Form 1095 ,
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) ,
Internal Revenue Code (IRC) ,
IRS ,
Large Employer ,
Minimum Essential Coverage ,
Multiemployer Plan ,
PHI ,
Premiums ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Tax Credits ,
Tax Extensions ,
Tax Penalties ,
Trade Preferences Extension Act (TPEA) ,
Waivers
Alden Bianchi, Chair of Mintz Levin’s Employee Benefits & Executive Compensation Practice, will provide a weekly installment on the complex reporting obligations outlined by the Affordable Care Act for health insurance...more
The Affordable Care Act (ACA) imposes information reporting rules on providers of minimum essential coverage, e.g., insurance carriers and self-funded plans, and on applicable large employers, i.e., those employers that are...more
7/27/2015
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Employer Group Health Plans ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employer Mandates ,
Good Faith ,
Health Insurance ,
Healthcare ,
IRS ,
Minimum Essential Coverage ,
New Legislation ,
Penalties ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Section 6722 ,
Self-Funded Health Plans ,
Trade Preferences Extension Act (TPEA)
Alden Bianchi, Chair of the our Employee Benefits & Executive Compensation Practice, will provide a weekly installment on the complex reporting obligations outlined by the Affordable Care Act for health insurance carriers and...more
7/20/2015
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Compliance ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Employer Group Health Plans ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employer Mandates ,
Exceptions ,
Good Faith ,
Health Insurance ,
Individual Mandate ,
IRS ,
Minimum Essential Coverage ,
Penalties ,
Popular ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Self-Funded Health Plans
Reports in the popular media portrayed King v. Burwell as a case involving premium tax subsidies used to purchase health insurance from public exchanges or marketplaces under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). According to an...more
7/7/2015
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Employer Mandates ,
Health Insurance ,
Health Insurance Exchanges ,
IRS ,
King v Burwell ,
SCOTUS ,
Shared Responsibility Rule ,
State Health Insurance Exchanges ,
Subsidies ,
Tax Credits
In this volume, we have collected the 52 weekly blog posts that comprise the series entitled, The Affordable Care Act—Countdown to Compliance for Employers. The series appeared in the Mintz Levin Employment Matters Blog...more
2/25/2015
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) ,
Cafeteria Plans ,
Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) ,
Employer Group Health Plans ,
Employer Mandates ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Full-Time Employees ,
Health Insurance ,
Honeywell International ,
HSA ,
Minimum Value Plans ,
Pay or Play ,
Self-Insured Health Plans ,
Shared Responsibility Rule ,
Wellness Programs
The Affordable Care Act is the single most important piece of Federal social legislation in more than a generation. While there was and is broad agreement on the law’s principal goals—to expand medical coverage, increase the...more
Regulations implementing the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) employer shared responsibility rules including the substantive “pay-or-play” rules and the accompanying reporting rules were adopted in February. Regulations...more
As applicable large employers grapple with the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) employer shared responsibility (pay-or-play) rules, two questions arise with notable frequency...more
12/8/2014
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Cafeteria Plans ,
Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) ,
Employer Group Health Plans ,
Employer Mandates ,
Flexible Spending Accounts ,
IRS ,
Non-Discrimination Rules ,
Pay or Play ,
Public Health Service Act ,
Shared Responsibility Rule
While my entries have focused principally on the employer shared responsibility rules of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), every once in a while an item comes along that nevertheless grabs my attention. The treatment of wellness...more
Over the last couple of months, we have followed and reported on a particular ACA compliance strategy under which an employer subject to the Affordable Care Act’s employer shared responsibility (or “pay-or-play”) rules...more
Last year, the Department of Labor and the Treasury Department/IRS (Departments) issued guidance on the application of certain of the Affordable Care Act’s insurance market reforms to health reimbursement arrangements (HRAs),...more
In a previous post, we described an Affordable Care Act compliance strategy—referred to commercially as a “minimum value plan” or “MVP”—that involves an offer of group health plan coverage that, while similar in most respects...more