Employee Benefits Blog

What the heck is MEC?

Health care reform is confusing.  There are so many new terms and concepts.  One concept that has been getting a lot of attention lately is MEC.  MEC stands for “minimum essential coverage” and is a fancy name for basic health coverage. MEC is important for two main reasons — First, starting in 2014, individuals who don’t […]

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Final Regs on Health Care Reform Large Employer Penalties Keep Many Transition Rules

The proposed regulations included many helpful transition rules.  Although I hoped that the transition rules would be extended, I really didn’t think they would be.  The good news is — I thought wrong.  A package of limited transition rules that applied to 2014 under the proposed regulations has been extended to 2015, including: Special 6 […]

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Final Regs on Health Care Reform Large Employer Penalties Include New Transition Relief Easing Employers Into Compliance

The IRS issued final regulations implementing the employer shared responsibility penalties on February 12, 2014.  As promised in an earlier post, I have updated our Checklist for Employers to reflect the final regulations.  Although the Checklist explains many of the transition rules, below is a summary of what I think are two of the most […]

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IRS Finally Issues Final Regs on Health Care Reform Large Employer Penalties — Employers May Want to Start Compliance Efforts Now

In July 2013, Treasury announced that the large employer shared responsibility penalties would not take effect until 2015.  This one-year delay was welcome news, but it unfortunately resulted in many employers pushing this issue to the back burner. With the IRS just having published final regulations on February 12, 2014, now is a great time […]

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