As businesses grow and evolve, their employee benefits packages often become more complex. With a variety of health plans, coverage options, and eligibility criteria to manage, staying compliant with ACA requirements can be challenging. Incorrectly managing benefits eligibility, misreporting hours worked, or failing to comply with ACA regulations can result in costly penalties and audits. ACA-Track simplifies this process by automating the tracking, reporting, and management of employee benefits, ensuring compliance for businesses with complex benefits structures.
The Complexity of Employee Benefits in ACA Compliance
Many businesses offer a variety of benefits packages to employees based on factors such as job classification, work hours, or seniority. While this approach helps provide customized benefits, it also adds complexity when it comes to ACA compliance. Some of the key challenges businesses with complex employee benefits face include:
- Multiple Health Plans: Businesses may offer different health insurance plans to employees, such as high-deductible plans, PPOs, and HMOs. Managing the eligibility for each plan and ensuring that the right employees are enrolled in the right coverage can be difficult to track manually.
- Eligibility Variations by Job Classification: Full-time, part-time, seasonal, and variable-hour employees may have different eligibility thresholds for health coverage. Ensuring that eligibility is calculated correctly for each group can be a significant administrative burden.
- Dependent Coverage: Businesses may offer different coverage options for employees’ dependents, which complicates eligibility calculations and reporting for both employees and their families.
- Affordable Care Act (ACA) Affordability Standards: ACA requires businesses to provide affordable coverage that meets minimum value standards. Businesses must ensure that their health plans comply with these affordability standards for full-time employees and their dependents.
- IRS Reporting Requirements: Form 1095-C and Form 1094-C must be completed accurately to report the coverage offered to employees. Incorrect reporting or failure to include all employees can lead to penalties.
ACA-Track automates the process of managing these complexities by offering a centralized platform that integrates employee data, tracks benefits eligibility, and generates accurate reports, ensuring that businesses meet all ACA compliance requirements.
How ACA-Track Streamlines Employee Benefits Compliance
ACA-Track is designed to handle complex employee benefits structures, providing businesses with the tools they need to manage ACA compliance efficiently. Here’s how ACA-Track helps businesses with complex employee benefits:
1. Automates Health Plan and Coverage Group Management
For businesses offering multiple health plans or coverage groups, ACA-Track simplifies the process by automating the tracking of employee participation in each plan. Whether an employee is enrolled in a high-deductible health plan, a PPO, or an HMO, ACA-Track ensures that all employees are enrolled in the correct plan based on their eligibility and job classification. The system tracks and monitors employee participation across different coverage groups, making ACA compliance easy to manage for businesses with diverse benefits offerings.
2. Tracks Eligibility for Different Job Classifications
ACA-Track automatically tracks eligibility for employees based on their job classification, work hours, and employment status. Full-time employees, part-time workers, seasonal employees, and variable-hour employees all have different eligibility thresholds for ACA coverage, and ACA-Track ensures that each employee’s eligibility is accurately calculated based on their specific work hours and job classification. This automation reduces the risk of misclassification or incorrect eligibility determinations.
3. Calculates Affordability Standards
ACA-Track automatically calculates whether the health coverage offered to employees meets the affordability standards set by the ACA. Businesses are required to provide coverage that is both affordable and meets minimum value standards. ACA-Track tracks whether the employer-sponsored coverage costs no more than 9.12% (2023 figure) of an employee’s household income. The system ensures that businesses meet ACA affordability criteria for full-time employees and their dependents, eliminating the risk of noncompliance.
4. Comprehensive Reporting and E-Filing
ACA-Track automates the generation of ACA-required forms, including Form 1094-C and Form 1095-C, which must be filed with the IRS. The platform ensures that these forms are filled out accurately and that the right information is included for each employee, whether they’re enrolled in health coverage, declined coverage, or are part of a special coverage group. The system also allows businesses to file these forms electronically, reducing the administrative burden and ensuring timely submission to the IRS.
5. Tracks Dependent Coverage
Businesses that offer dependent coverage must ensure that ACA coverage extends to eligible dependents. ACA-Track helps businesses track which employees are offering dependent coverage and ensures that the correct dependents are included in ACA reporting. This is especially important for businesses with large or diverse workforces where different employees may have varying family structures.
6. Real-Time Alerts for Compliance Issues
ACA-Track offers real-time alerts that notify businesses when an employee becomes eligible for coverage, when there’s a discrepancy in coverage or hours worked, or when ACA deadlines are approaching. These proactive alerts ensure that businesses can take immediate action to address compliance issues before they become problematic.
The Benefits of Using ACA-Track for Complex Employee Benefits Compliance
- Automated Tracking and Reporting: ACA-Track automates health plan management, employee eligibility tracking, and reporting, ensuring that businesses remain compliant without manual intervention.
- Accurate Compliance Calculations: ACA-Track calculates affordability and eligibility based on employee work hours, job classifications, and benefits participation, reducing the risk of errors.
- Centralized Data Management: All employee and benefits data is stored in one secure location, making it easy to manage compliance and retrieve data for reporting or audits.
- Affordability and Coverage Tracking: ACA-Track ensures that health coverage meets ACA affordability standards and that dependent coverage is tracked for eligible employees.
- Timely Filing and IRS Error Correction: ACA-Track automates Form 1094-C and Form 1095-C filing, and provides error correction support if discrepancies are found after filing.
Streamline Your Benefits Compliance with ACA-Track
ACA compliance for businesses with complex employee benefits packages can be daunting, but ACA-Track makes it easier by automating eligibility tracking, reporting, and compliance monitoring. Whether you’re managing multiple coverage options, ensuring affordability standards are met, or handling dependent coverage, ACA-Track simplifies the process, so you can stay focused on what matters most—your employees.
If you’re ready to streamline your ACA compliance and ensure your employee benefits are compliant, visit ACA-Track Full-Service ACA Tracking and Reporting to learn more about how ACA-Track can support your business with complex benefits compliance.
