September 4, 2013
www.gfb.org
Vol. 31 No. 36
DEADLINE FOR KEY HEALTHCARE REQUIREMENT APPROACHING Under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), also referred to as Obamacare, employers will be required to give current employees an exchange notice by Oct. 1. The exchange notice is intended to inform employees of the availability of health insurance through state or federally run insurance exchanges, and provide information about the benefits and costs related to the decision on whether to buy insurance through the exchange. The notice must be provided to all current full-time, part-time and seasonal employees, including H-2A workers. It is required whether the employer offers healthcare insurance to their employees or not. Employees hired after Oct. 1 must be provided with the exchange notice within 14 days of the date of hire. According to a fact sheet from the American Farm Bureau Federation, farm employers who are subject to the Fair Labor Standards Act are required to provide the exchange notice. The exchange notice must include the name and contact information of the health exchange available in the employer’s state. A listing of state insurance exchanges is available online at https://www.healthcare.gov/what-is-the-health-insurancemarketplace/. The notice must also describe the services provided by the exchange available in the employer’s state, inform employees that they may be eligible for premium tax credits or cost sharing reductions if they choose to purchase health coverage on the exchange, inform the employees that if they elect to purchase health coverage on the exchange (and not an employer-sponsored plan), the employee will forfeit the company’s contribution to his or her health coverage premium. Employees may also lose the related tax benefit associated with health insurance premium contribution since it may have been excludable from the employee’s income for federal income and payroll tax purposes. The exchange notice must be given in either written or electronic form to each employee. It is recommended that employers provide written notice via first-class mail or deliver the exchange notice in-person. Employers may also consider requiring each employee to sign a document acknowledging receipt. According to the AFBF fact sheet, employers are solely responsible for the costs of providing the exchange notice to their employees. The U.S. Department of Labor has a model notice employers can use. It is available at http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/pdf/FLSAwithplans.pdf .