Beginning January 1, 2020, employers will have the option to reimburse employees’ individual ACA Exchange (or Marketplace) health insurance premiums under an employer-sponsored Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA). This is a significant change from current rules, which generally permit an HRA to reimburse only group (not individual) health insurance coverage, and which prohibit employer reimbursement of […]
April 15, 2019 marked not only the end of the 2018 personal income tax season, but also the beginning of a new era of enforcement of Wisconsin employment practices. On that date, Governor Tony Evers issued an Executive Order creating a Joint Task Force on Payroll Fraud and Worker Misclassification (the “Task Force”). This Task […]
The IRS Employee Plans division on Friday, April 19, released an updated version of its comprehensive retirement plan correction protocol. Although touted as a “limited update” to the Employee Plan Compliance Resolution System, or EPCRS, the changes contained in this new Revenue Procedure 2019-19 nonetheless offer substantial savings opportunities for certain employer sponsors of 401(k), […]
Employers who are classified as covered entities under HIPAA are required to report any 2018 breach of protected health information that affected fewer than 500 individuals (also known as a small breach) by March 1, 2019. This current breach notification requirement arises from amendments made to HIPAA under the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical […]
The two-year budget agreement passed by Congress on Friday, February 9th, and signed by President Trump later that day, includes tax policy changes that affect qualified retirement plans. Specifically, qualified retirement plan hardship withdrawal operations will be impacted by the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018 (the Budget Act) as follows: Removal of the six-month prohibition […]
Employer sponsors of nonqualified deferred compensation (NQDC) plans, as well as the executives and other service providers, who benefit from them, can breathe a sigh of relief. The ability to reward and retain key employees with incentive and compensation plans that provide a current opportunity to earn a payment to be provided (and taxed) in […]
Buried in IRS guidance issued on November 2 is news that the IRS will soon be issuing notices to employers of potential ACA taxes. While the ACA employer payments are widely referred to as “penalties,” they are actually “assessable payments” in the form an excise tax. Specifically, the IRS has announced that applicable large employers […]
The Internal Revenue Service has released the cost-of-living adjustments to the dollar limits under various employer-sponsored benefit plans for 2018. Several key limits (indicated in bold, below) have been increased for 2018. Employer-sponsors of benefit plans should update payroll and plan administration systems for the 2018 limits and ensure that any new limits are incorporated […]
If your organization is a public school or university, a tax-exempt charter school or hospital, a church, church-affiliated entity, or other tax-exempt organization, it is eligible to sponsor a 403(b) retirement plan. For any eligible sponsor of a 403(b) plan, it is critical, to ensure the ongoing tax-compliance of the plan, to conform your document […]
At 11:59 p.m. on Friday, June 9, 2017 (the Effective Date), the ERISA definition of a fiduciary will expand to include, for the first time, many financial firms and advisors that provide investment advice to certain employer-sponsored retirement plans and individual retirement accounts (IRAs). This is because part of the final Department of Labor (DOL) […]
