Employer Mandate
Whether it be to inflation adjustments, new laws, tweaks to existing regulations or other reasons, each new year brings changes to health plans and other benefits. Here is a summary of 10 important changes taking effect in 2019.
1) There will be no penalty under federal law if you don’t have health insurance. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act made the cost for not having health insurance $0 starting in 2019.
The Employer Mandate regulations refer to seasonal employees and seasonal workers, and yes, there is a difference. Let’s break this down as simply as possible by starting with a few refresher points.
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has updated its Questions and Answers website in regards to the Employer Mandate, and it appears they have started to send initial notices to employers who are subject to a penalty for the 2015 year (generally, this will be employers with 100 or more employees since transition relief was available in 2015 to employers with 50-99 employees).
The original version of this article was published on January 15, 2016. It has been updated annualy to account for inflationary changes.
Spoiler Alert: The answer is no.
Unless or until the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is repealed, the Individual and Employer Mandates remain intact, and earlier this month the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) issued some regulatory guidance pertaining to the two mandates for 2018.
The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) issued a report dated April 7th and entitled “Affordable Care Act: Assessment of Efforts to Implement the Employer Shared Responsibility Provision.” In other words, TIGTA issued a report about the efforts of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to collect Employer Mandate penalties.
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