Legal - Update from April 16th Reporting The government recently released final regulations regarding the reporting requirements that begin January 1, 2015 for all employers with 50 or more full-time employees, including full-time equivalents. The statute calls for employers, insurers, and other reporting entities to report information including: • For section 6055 - completed by insurance company or employer, if self-funded • Designed to aid the IRS in its enforcement of the individual mandate • Information about the entity providing coverage, including contact information. • Which individuals are enrolled in coverage, with identifying information and the months for which they were covered. • For section 6056 - completed by the employer • Used by the IRS in its enforcement of the employer play or pay mandate as well as administering individual premium assistance tax credits. • Information about the employer offering coverage (including contact information and the number of full-time employees). • For each full-time employee, information about the coverage (if any) offered to the employee, by month, including the lowest employee cost of self-only coverage offered. For employers that provide a qualifying offer to any of their full time employees, there is a simplified alternative to reporting monthly, employee-specific information. A qualifying offer is an offer of minimum value coverage that provides employee-only coverage at a cost to the employee of no more than about $1,100 in 2015 (9.5 percent of the Federal Poverty Level), combined with an offer of coverage for the employees family. • For employees who receive a qualifying offer for all 12 months of the year, employers will need to report only the names, addresses, and taxpayer identification numbers (TINs). Employers will also give the employees a copy of that simplified report or a standard statement indicating that the employee received a full-year qualifying offer. • For employees who receive a qualifying offer for fewer than all 12 months of the year, employers will be able to simply report to the IRS and employees for each of those months by simply entering a code indicating that the qualifying offer was made. • To provide for a phase-in of the simplified option, employers certifying that they have made a qualifying offer to at least 95% of their full-time employees (plus an offer to their families) will be able to use an even simpler alternative reporting method for 2015. Those employers will be able to use the simplified, streamlined reporting method for their entire workforce, including employees who do not receive a qualifying offer for the full year. Those employers will provide employees with standard statements relating to their possible eligibility for premium tax credits. • The final regulations also give employers the option to avoid identifying in the report which of its employees are full-time, and instead to just include employees who may be full-time. To take advantage of this option, the employer must certify that it offered affordable, minimum value coverage to at least 98 percent of the employees on whom it is reporting.
Posted on: Mon, 19 May 2014 20:35:00 +0000