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Welcome to the Snell & Wilmer Benefits Blog. We will be posting about current employee benefits and executive compensation topics and issues. We invite you to contact the authors with your thoughts or questions.Blog Contributors
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IRS Letters 226J: Having the Right Section 4980H Records Can Be Worth a Small Fortune
As reported in our 2018 End of Year Plan Sponsor “To Do” List (Part 1) Health & Welfare, the Section 4980H penalties are still in effect and the IRS is enforcing them. Employers continue to receive Letters 226J, which the IRS uses to propose employer shared responsibility payments. During the Letter 226J process, the IRS has been allowing employers to challenge proposed penalties and to correct reporting errors. However, the IRS will not necessarily accept an employer’s word at face value.
Recordkeeping is key
One of the biggest problems employers may face is finding records to prove they satisfied the 95% offer of coverage test (to avoid the subsection (a) penalty) or that they offered a specified employee minimum value affordable coverage (to avoid the subsection (b) penalty). Read More ›
Posted in Employee Benefits, Health & Welfare Plans, Health Care Reform
| Tagged 4980H, ACA, Affordable Care Act, Form 1094-C, Form 1095-c, IRS, letter 226j, recordkeeper, vendor
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HHS to Start Randomly Selecting Health Plans for HIPAA Compliance – Are You Ready?
The CMS Division of National Standards, on behalf of HHS, is launching the Compliance Review Program (the “Program”) to ensure compliance among covered entities with HIPAA Administrative Simplification rules for electronic health care transactions. HHS will randomly select health plans and clearinghouses to assess compliance with: (1) transaction formats; (2) code sets; and (3) unique identifiers. Participants in the Program will also have to attest whether they comply with the operating rules, which are required by the ACA and are defined as “the necessary business rules and guidelines for the electronic exchange of information that are not defined by a standard or its implementation specifications.”
If HHS finds that a health plan or clearinghouse is not compliant, HHS has indicated that it will give the covered entity the opportunity to correct issues and achieve compliance, but may impose penalties on covered entities that do not achieve compliance. Read More ›
Posted in Health & Welfare Plans, Health Care Reform
| Tagged audit, Breach Notification, CMS, HHS, HIPAA, Privacy, Security
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Director Compensation Update
I’ve written a number of articles and blogs about some sticky issues that can surface in the context of setting pay for public company non-employee directors (here, here, here, and here).
On March 6th the parties to the In re Investors Bancorp, Inc. Stockholder Litigation, filed a settlement agreement with the Delaware Chancery Court. By way of background, the Investors Bancorp decision limited the shareholder ratification defense for non-employee director equity awards that were granted on a discretionary basis. The equity plan at issue in In re Investors Bancorp, which had been approved by the company’s shareholders, provided that the maximum number of shares that could be delivered to all non-employee directors, in the aggregate, would be capped at 30% of all option or restricted stock unit or restricted stock awards available for grant under the plan. Read More ›
Posted in Employee Benefits, Executive Compensation
| Tagged business judgment rule, director equity awards, equity awards, Executive Compensation, Investors Bancorp
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IRS Changes Course on Lump Sums to Retirees
In Notice 2019-18, the Internal Revenue Service (the “IRS”) changed its position and now will permit employers to offer lump sum payments to retirees who are currently receiving annuity payments from a defined benefit plan. This is a reversal from its position in Notice 2015-49, in which the Treasury Department and the IRS stated that they intended to propose amendments to the required minimum distribution regulations to address the payment of lump sums to replace ongoing annuity payments under a defined benefit plan. Prior to the issuance of Notice 2015-49, a number of defined benefit plans started offering retirees who were receiving annuities an opportunity to elect to convert their annuities into lump sum benefits during a limited period of time in what became known as “de-risking” transactions. Read More ›
Posted in Employee Benefits, Qualified Retirement Plans
| Tagged annuities, annuity, IRS, lump sum, notice 2015-49, notice 2019-18, retirees
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Arizona’s New Mini-COBRA Statute Has Arrived, but Is Preemption a Concern?
The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985 (“COBRA”) requires employers who have 20 or more employees and who offer a group health insurance plan to provide enrollees with a right to continue coverage after the occurrence of certain qualifying events. Effective January 1, 2019, Section 20-2330 of the Arizona Revised Statutes (“A.R.S.”) seeks to extend a similar right to Arizona employees of “small employers” who have at least 1 but not more than 20 employees. The new rule applies to insured health benefit plans issued or renewed after December 31, 2018. Self-insured health benefit plans are exempt from Section 20-2330. Read More ›
Posted in Employee Benefits, Health & Welfare Plans
| Tagged Arizona, COBRA, mini-COBRA, small employers
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Seeing the Big Picture – How Proposed Health Reimbursement Arrangements Might Harmonize with Existing Law
On October 29, 2018, proposed regulations were published in the Federal Register that would permit employers to offer two new types of health reimbursement arrangements (“HRAs”) that align with the requirements of the Affordable Care Act (the “ACA”). The proposed HRAs are designed to expand the availability of account-based group health plans. A summary of the proposed regulations – and the HRAs that they would permit if finalized – can be found in our November 7, 2018, blog, “Zombie Benefits – Are Health Reimbursement Arrangements Back from the Dead?”
As an addendum to the proposed regulations, the IRS published Notice 2018-88, which considers the interaction of the new HRAs with the employer shared responsibility mandate set out in Code Section 4980H and the non-discrimination rules contained in Code Section 105(h). Read More ›
Posted in Employee Benefits, Health & Welfare Plans, Health Care Reform
| Tagged 2018-88, 4980H, ACA, HRA, IRS, Notice
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Wilderness Therapy – Should We Give It Another Look?
1. What is it?
Wilderness therapy generally is traditional therapy in an outdoor setting that seeks to treat young adults with behavioral or substance use disorders. Some programs are licensed and accredited and the treatment they provide can be expensive. It is not uncommon for wilderness therapy to cost $500 per day or over $40,000 in total.
2. Why should you care?
A participant in your employer-sponsored group health plan might submit a claim for wilderness therapy or request that your plan cover it. If the terms of your plan exclude wilderness therapy or are ambiguous with respect to its coverage, and if you choose not to cover it, the participant might argue that your plan violates the Mental Health Parity Act of 1996 (MHPA) and the Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008 (MHPAEA) (collectively, “Federal Mental Health Parity Law”). Read More ›
Posted in Employee Benefits, Health & Welfare Plans, Health Care Reform
| Tagged litigation, Mental Health Parity, NQTL, therapy, wilderness
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Certain Information Statements for ISOs and ESPPs Due by January 31, 2019
As reported in Part 4 of our 2018 End of Year Plan Sponsor “To Do” List, Section 6039 of the Code requires employers to provide a written information statement to each employee or former employee and file information returns with the IRS regarding: (1) the transfer of stock pursuant to the exercise of an Incentive Stock Option (“ISO”); and (2) the first transfer by the employee or former employee of stock purchased at a discount under an Employee Stock Purchase Plan (“ESPP”). For ISO exercises and ESPP transfers occurring in 2018, the Section 6039 employee information statement requirement is satisfied by providing Form 3921 (for ISOs) and Form 3922 (for ESPPs) to employees no later than January 31, 2019. Read More ›
Posted in Employee Benefits, Executive Compensation
| Tagged 2019, deadline, Employee Stock Purchase Plan, ESPP, Incentive Stock Option, information returns, ISO, January 31, stock
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New IRS Guidance Throws a Pass to Certain Universities That Pay Coaches Compensation in Excess of $1,000,000
In Notice 2019-09 (“Notice”), the IRS provides relief from the new excise tax to certain colleges and universities that pay their “covered employees” more than $1 million per year or pay excess parachute payments. Specifically, the Notice provides that the new excise tax under Code Section 4960 does not apply to a governmental entity (including a state college or university) that is not tax-exempt under Code Section 501(a) and does not exclude income under Code Section 115(l). Therefore, those state universities that do not rely on either of these statutory exemptions from income are not subject to Code Section 4960 even if they pay their coaches (or other covered employees) more than $1 million. Read More ›
Posted in Employee Benefits, Executive Compensation
| Tagged Code Section 4960, limit, notice 2019-09, parachute, tax-exempt, tax-exempt organizations
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EEOC Removes 30% Incentive Safe Harbor from Wellness Program Regulations
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (the “EEOC”) issued final rules, published in the Federal Register on December 20, 2018, that remove the 30% incentive provisions from the EEOC’s wellness program regulations governing the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”) and the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (“GINA”). The final rules are effective January 1, 2019. As a reminder, the ADA rules previously provided that a wellness program that asks questions about employees’ health or includes medical examinations is not voluntary if the incentive to encourage employee participation in the program exceeds 30% of the total cost of self-only coverage. The GINA rules previously provided that an employer may not offer an incentive that exceeds 30% of the total cost of self-only coverage to an employee to encourage a spouse’s participation in a health risk assessment under a wellness program. Read More ›