Employee benefit planning services under the Affordable Care Act

I offer a range of professional services to help employers get the most from the changes triggered by the Affordable Care Act. These services are available individually or in combination. These planning issues turn out to be just as important for small employers not subject to the shared responsibility payments as for larger employers.

Goals

The goals of this service may include:

• Avoid or minimize employer penalties
• Reduce employer costs
• Maximize government-paid benefits for lower income employees
• Allow employers to provide higher levels of health care to executives and key employees
• Provide employees with better information about their health care options
• Integrate health care with other employee benefit plans and overall compensation planning
• Qualify the employer for tax credits
• Qualify the employee for subsidies

Services

My services may include:

1. General benefits planning and strategy testing
2. Compliance testing and attestation
3. Review of employee benefit plan documents and other required documentation
4. Minimum Essential Benefit confirmation
5. Minimum Value confirmation
6. Affordability testing and attestation
7. Employee notifications
8. Tax return preparation (either for the benefits plan only or the entire tax reporting entity)
9. Business and individual benefits planning
10. Individual employee consultations
11. Other agreed-upon procedures

I've provided this service to businesses ranging from one self-employed professional to firms with more than 500 employees in multiple states and work locations.

The most difficult aspects of this service typically involves non-insurance benefits. Employers who formerly provided benefits through a Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA), for example, are typically unable to continue that type of plan.

Fees

I offer a mini-consultation at a flat fee of $100. See this page for details. I suggest that this is typically the most practical way to address small business ACA-related issues.

The price of other ongoing additional health plan service engagements have ranged from $20 to $150 per employee per year. This cost is typically expected to be recouped in cost savings from insurance and gains in subsidies granted to employees in addition to the potential tax savings and increased benefits to employees.

Fulfillment

These specific benefits planning services are most efficiently provided on a remote basis rather than on-site. I have no indication that in-person service results in any better outcome for the employer or the employees. For this reason I am set up to provide these service by telephone, email and various Internet-based video platforms as requested. 

Service typically begins with a scheduled telephone call that lasts about 30 minutes. An initial call can be arranged under the terms of service of an initial consultation. Any service after that would be specifically designed for your business situation and the terms agreed upon in advance.