Boston Common Partners

Employees Taking Charge of their Health Care Costs – Study

admin — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 16:14:28 +0000

Employers and employees alike have found a more affordable health care option in health savings accounts, according to two national surveys released last week.
The surveys, commissioned by ACS, an IT and BPO firm, show that 77% of employers believe that high-deductible health plans with an HSA are key in controlling health care costs. Additionally, more than 56% of account holders have found that their HSA-qualified plan provides an affordable health care option.
“This year’s survey results reveal an interesting phenomenon – HSAs are doing more than just saving consumers and employers money. They are prompting a shift in behavior that is helping employees make better decisions about their own health care,” says Tom Hricik, principal with ACS.
Three-quarters of respondents say the ability to control their own health costs personally is an “extremely” or “very” important benefit of HSAs. Not only are account holders setting aside more money than before they had an HSA to cover potential medical costs (54%), but they are also engaging in healthier lifestyle choices (18%), researching preventive care programs (18%), shopping for lower priced prescription drugs (28%) and planning health care better throughout the year (31%). Individuals perceive that they consume medical services at approximately the same rate but are shopping for care more than before.
HDHPs are less costly to employers for both individual and family coverage. Employers report that the cost of providing HSA-qualified plans is less than the cost of providing a standard preferred provider organization. The average direct cost to provide an HDHP/HSA is $5,469 for individual coverage and $9,909 for family coverage. In comparison, the average PPO cost is $7,158 for individuals and $10,691 for family.
These positive trends in cost savings and account holder behavior make it easier for employers to continue offering competitive health care options for employees, says Hricik. Only 6% stated that they are at least very likely to discontinue offering the HSA-qualified plan in the future. And, only 7% of employers stated that they would be at least very likely to move employees to future health care exchanges.
Other significant findings include:
The average employer that implemented an HDHP and HSA program has 49% of eligible employees enrolled in the HDHP.
69% of employer respondents contributed to their employees’ HSA accounts.
72% of account holders indicated that they actively chose the HSA-qualified plan although other plan options exist for them.
82% of account holders surveyed reported that the ability to save tax-free money was “extremely” or “very” important in selecting an HSA-qualified plan.
These surveys, commissioned in the fall of 2011 by ACS and conducted by Buck Consultants, both of which are Xerox companies, generated more than 14,000 existing account holder and 300 employer responses. The surveys are the largest ever conducted on the subject of HDHPs and HSAs.

FMLA 2011: Year in Review- Steps Employers Should Take…

admin — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 17:49:15 +0000

2011 was a busy year for the FMLA. In 2011, the Obama administration and the courts have continued to expand the scope and effect of the FMLA, as well as other laws related to medical conditions and liability. This year brought major developments to the FMLA, including the new ADAAA regulations, GINA’s safe harbor rules, DOL’s interpretation of the in loco parentis rule, and several court cases interpreting the FMLA and related issues.
ADAAA Changes to Disability Coverage—FMLA Serious Health Conditions
Effective May 24, 2011, final regulations were issued by EEOC implementing the ADAAA and reflecting the ADAAA’s broader definition of the term “disability.” As a result of the ADAAA and final regulations, more individuals now have covered disabilities and qualify for protection under the ADA. For employers, this generally means shifting their approach from one that focuses on verifying that a person has an ADA disability to one that uses the interactive process to see if there’s an effective accommodation that will allow an employee to perform the essential functions of his or her job.
According to EEOC, the primary focus in ADA cases should now be whether employers have complied with their obligations under the ADA and whether discrimination has occurred, not whether the individual meets the definition of the ADA “should not demand extensive analysis.”
The practical effect of the ADAAA on FMLA compliance is the increased crossover between ADA-protected disabilities and FMLA-protected serious health conditions. As a result, employers will be called upon to offer not only FMLA leave, but more often now, an extension of leave to accommodate those employees who have both a serious health condition and a disability.
Steps Employers Should Take. The following are steps employers should take to address the changes brought about by the recent changes to the ADA:
• Ensure that employees who qualify for FMLA leave because of their own serious health condition are also considered for ADA coverage, additional leave, and/or other accommodation.
• Coordinate medical certification process so that the two legal standards (for serious health conditions and potential disability qualification) are met individually and documented sufficiently.
• Review job descriptions to ensure regulatory compliance—detailing the essential functions in a job description will help ensure that applicants and employees with disabilities are not discriminated against because they cannot perform marginal job duties.
• Train supervisors and managers about complying with the amended ADA, in particular about the interactive process, requests for accommodation, and types of reasonable accommodation. Training supervisors not to retaliate in response to disability claims or requests for accommodation is also critical.
• Check recordkeeping processes to ensure adequate documentation of accommodation requests, steps in the interactive process, and reasons for granting/denying an accommodation request.
• Check equal employment/nondiscrimination policies to make sure they comply with the amended ADA and regulatory requirements.
EEOC’s Final GINA Regulations—And How They Affect FMLA Compliance
In January 2011, EEOC’s final regulations that interpret and implement the nondiscrimination requirements of GINA became effective. The final regulations include new information about the obligation of covered employers to avert possible disclosures of genetic information by healthcare providers, including during the processing of FMLA leave.
With some exceptions, GINA prohibits employers from requesting or acquiring genetic information about employees and the family members of employees. It also prohibits employers that obtain genetic information (whether legitimately or not) from discriminating against an employee, job applicant, or former employee on the basis of genetic information.
Safe Harbor Language for Medical Inquiries. The GINA statute and regulations recognize that employers may come into possession of some kinds of genetic information legitimately as part of the FMLA certification process. Specifically, GINA provides that it is not unlawful for an employer to request family medical history as part of a medical certification for leave taken under the FMLA or similar state leave laws.
The safe harbor language warns healthcare providers not to reveal any genetic information in their response. If a medical provider discloses genetic information to the employer in spite of this warning, such disclosure will be deemed inadvertent and not in violation of GINA.
It is also recommended that employers also include the safe harbor language in requests for fitness-for-duty certification and in their instructions to any healthcare provider who is conducting a fitness-for-duty exam at the employer’s request.
DOL Issues Expansive Interpretation of In Loco Parentis Standard
The U.S. DOL released a new “administrator interpretation” that clarifies the circumstances in which an employee may take leave to care for a child toward whom they act as a parent, but are not legally recognized as such. The so-called in loco parentis provision also applies to situations where a person or people acted in the place of a parent for the employee when the employee was a child.
According to the administrator interpretation, in loco parentis status requires a consideration of multiple factors, including:
• The age of the child;
• The degree to which the child is dependent on the person claiming to be standing in loco parentis;
• The amount of support, if any, provided; and
• The extent to which duties commonly associated with parenthood are exercised.
The key is the employee’s intent to assume the status of a parent, which can be inferred from the employee’s actions with regard to the child.
In addition, although DOL does not come right out and say it, it appears that the most important factor is the extent to which the employee exercises—or intends to exercise, for newborn or newly adopted children—parental duties.
In addition to same-sex couples, the administrator interpretation also enunciates certain principles that may be applied to other nontraditional family settings. The first principle is that employees who care for a child on a daily basis will be considered in loco parentis even if they provide no financial support for the child. The second principle is that there is no limit as to how many people can be considered in loco parentis to a particular child.
Recent Court Decisions
In the continuing evolution of FMLA law, several judicial decisions changed the way in which the FMLA will be interpreted and enforced. Included in those changes are an employer’s obligations to provide more ADA leave than the FMLA requires, the extension of retaliation protection to third parties, and the addition of “cat’s paw” liability to discrimination and FMLA cases.
Obligations to Provide Leave. Several cases recently decided or settled address an employer’s obligations to provide more leave that the FMLA requires as a reasonable accommodation under the ADA. Most recently, EEOC entered into a consent decree with Verizon, the agency collected $20 million to settle claims that it refused to make exceptions to its “no fault” attendance plans to accommodate employees with disabilities. Verizon’s attendance policy provided that after an employee accumulated a certain number of “chargeable absences,” the employee would be subject to progressive disciplinary steps that could result in termination. EEOC asserted that Verizon failed to provide a reasonable accommodation—i.e., flexibility in its attendance policy—for employees who incurred absences caused by their disabilities.
It is becoming clearer that EEOC has been paying particular attention to employers that have a policy of automatically terminating employees who fail to return to work after they’ve exhausted FMLA and/or workers’ compensation leave. EEOC, which is responsible for enforcing the employment discrimination provisions of the American with Disabilities Act (ADA), has responded by bringing enforcement actions against such employers.
EEOC’s ADA Enforcement Guidance concludes that an employer may not apply a no-fault leave policy—under which employees are automatically terminated after they have been on leave for a certain period of time—to an employee with a disability who needs leave beyond the designated leave period.
When a disabled employee has exhausted his leave under the FMLA, workers’ comp, or the employer’s internal policies, the employer may be required to provide him or her with additional leave as a reasonable accommodation under the ADA. The only exceptions are if there is another effective accommodation that would return the employee to work, or granting additional leave would cause the employer an undue hardship.
These cases demonstrate that EEOC has its sights firmly set on inflexible fixed-term leave policies. In light of the agency’s continued doggedness on this topic, employers are well advised to take a close look at their leave of absence policies—not just those under the FMLA—as well as their procedures in administering and enforcing them. That is true even if the employer’s policy is more generous than the law requires.
As we all head in to 2012… what changes will you as employers and our clients face in leave management and FMLA compliance? We will have a white paper in the next two weeks to discuss possible changes in 2012.

Healthcare Reform : Questions and Answers Part II

admin — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 14:46:23 +0000

We have just passed the first anniversary of passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Our Clients across the country, continue to grapple with many provisions of this law. As a result, we have fielded many questions about this topic and this is the second in a series of articles/newsletters providing a sampling of some of the questions we’ve been receiving.

Q. We have some questions dealing with the administration of leaves and benefits continuation. Does healthcare reform affect when are we allowed to cancel coverage for non-payment when an employee is on FMLA leave?

A. Healthcare reform does not affect the FMLA’s benefits continuation rules. Please see our article on FLMA click here.

Q. If a person with a pre-existing condition is uninsured, and comes onto an employer-sponsored group health plan, do pre-existing waiting periods apply?

A. Preexisting condition exclusions are prohibited effective for plan years beginning on or after January 1, 2014, for all plans including grandfathered plans. Preexisting condition restrictions on children under 19 may not be applied by both existing (grandfathered) and new plans effective for the first plan year beginning on or after September 23, 2010.

Thus, in many cases, plans may still include preexisting condition coverage waiting periods.

Under current law plans may exclude preexisting conditions from coverage for no more than 12 months (18 months for late enrollees) from the plan’s enrollment date, including any waiting period before enrollment. A late enrollee is an individual who does not enroll when first eligible to do so. The exclusion applies only to conditions for which medical advice, diagnosis, care, or treatment was recommended or received during the 6-month period ending on the enrollment date. If a doctor recommended treatment before this 6-month look-back period, an individual can be subject to a preexisting condition exclusion only if he or she receives the recommended treatment within the 6-month look-back period.

Group health plans and issuers must reduce any preexisting condition exclusion period by the length of the aggregate period of prior creditable coverage. For example, if an employee was covered under one employer’s plan for 8 months and moves to a second employer, the 12-month preexisting condition exclusion under the second plan could apply for 4 months. Creditable coverage includes most types of public and private healthcare coverage, even short-term limited coverage. Prior coverage does not qualify if there is a significant break in coverage, which is defined as a break in healthcare coverage that is longer than 63 days.

The determination of whether an individual has had a 63-day break in coverage does not include the days of waiting periods and affiliation periods. In addition, proposed HIPAA Portability regulations provide that the 63-day period is tolled for an individual if a certificate of creditable coverage is not provided on or before the day coverage ceases. In those cases, the significant-break-in-coverage period is tolled until a certificate is provided or, if earlier, until 44 days after the coverage ceases.

Q. Are there any restrictions on an employer’s ability to offer only certain management-level employees health insurance benefits?

A. Detailed information on health insurance benefits is available on HR.BLR.com® under the topic Healthcare Insurance. Portions of the topic analysis are provided below for your convenience.

The Affordable Care Act provides that the provision of Internal Revenue Code Sec. 105(h) that has barred discrimination in favor of the highly compensated by self-insured plans also applies to nongrandfathered, insured group health plans.

Nondiscrimination rules. Under IRC Sec. 105(h), a plan may not discriminate in favor of highly compensated individuals as to eligibility to participate and the benefits provided under a plan.

Eligibility test. A plan satisfies the eligibility to participate test if it benefits:

70 percent or more of all employees, or 80 percent or more of all the employees who are eligible to benefit under the plan if 70 percent or more of all employees are eligible to benefit under the plan; or
Employees that qualify under a classification set up by the employer and found by IRS not to be discriminatory in favor of highly compensated individuals. Certain employees do not have to be counted when applying this test, including:
Employees who have not completed 3 years of service;
Employees who have not attained age 25; and
Part-time or seasonal employees.
Internal Revenue Service Regulations (26 CFR Sec. 1.105-11) provide that an employer may treat employees whose customary employment is less than 25 hours a week or 7 months a year as part-time or seasonal employees.

Benefits test. A plan must provide the same benefits that it provides to participants who are highly compensated individuals to all other participants.

Highly compensated individual. For the purpose of these tests, the term “highly compensated individual” means an individual who is:

One of the five highest paid officers,
A shareholder who owns more than 10 percent in value of the stock of the employer, or
Among the highest paid 25 percent of all employees.
Enforcement delayed. Enforcement of this provision has been delayed until sometime after regulatory guidance is issued (IRS Notice 2011-1). The IRS, with the agreement of DOL and HHS, has determined that because regulatory guidance is essential to the operation of this statutory provision, compliance with PHSA Sec. 2716 will not be required until after regulations or other administrative guidance has been issued. To provide insured group health plan sponsors time to implement any changes required by the regulations or other guidance, the IRS, DOL, and HHS anticipate that the guidance will not apply until plan years beginning a specified period after issuance. Before the beginning of those plan years, an insured group health plan sponsor will not be required to file IRS Form 8928 with respect to excise taxes resulting from discrimination in favor of the highly compensated by insured group health plans.

If the management-level employees in your question meet the definition of highly compensated employees, it is likely that offering health insurance benefits exclusively to those employees would violate the nondiscrimination rules.

Obama Supports Flexibility Within Affordable Care Act, New Proposed Rules

admin — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 23:36:47 +0000

President Obama said he supports the Empowering States to Innovate Act, a bill that amends the Affordable Care Act (ACA) to allow states to withdraw from certain ACA mandates in 2014 rather than in 2017, as long as they adopt alternative means to meet the reform law’s coverage and cost objectives.
“If your state can create a plan that covers as many people as affordably and comprehensively as the Affordable Care Act does — without increasing the deficit — you can implement that plan. And we’ll work with you to do it,” the President announced at the National Governors Association Meeting.
The Empowering States to Innovate Act would amend the ACA to allow states to apply for waivers of certain health insurance coverage requirements in such Act for plan years beginning on or after January 1, 2014, earlier than the current date of January 1, 2017.
The bill also would require the waiver application process to begin no later than 180 days after the enactment of the Empowering States to Innovate Act.

Overview of “State Innovation Waivers”
Under the ACA, state innovation waivers allow states to implement alternative policies, as long as they:

-Provide coverage that is at least as comprehensive as the coverage offered through Exchanges.
-Make coverage at least as affordable as it would have been through the Exchanges.
-Provide coverage to at least as many residents as the ACA would have provided.
-Do not increase the Federal deficit.
A White House fact sheet outlines several proposals that could qualify, including:

A streamlined system that links tax credits for small businesses with tax credits for low-income families.
-Alternatives to the individual responsibility provision – such as automatically enrolling individuals in health plans – that achieve similar outcomes.
-Alternative health plan options to increase competition and provide consumers with additional choices.
-An increase in the number of benefit levels to provide more choices for individuals and small businesses.
Immediately allowing large businesses interested in doing so to purchase health insurance through the new private marketplace, the State-based health insurance Exchange.
The bipartisan bill is sponsored by Senators Ron Wyden, (D-Oregon), Scott Brown, (R-Massachusetts), and Mary Landrieu, (D-Louisiana.) It has been referred to the Committee on Finance.

Proposed Rules
The Departments of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Treasury today proposed new rules outlining the steps states can take to receive a State Innovation Waiver under the ACA.

Healthcare.gov provides an outline of the proposed rules:

Public Notice: At the state and federal level, the law ensures an opportunity for public input. The proposed regulation outlines how public notice and comment should work, including public hearings, to ensure a meaningful level of public involvement, input, and transparency.
Content of the Application: Consistent with what is required by the law, the proposed rule says that an application must include:
The provisions of law that the state seeks to waive; An explanation of how the proposed waiver will meet the goals related to coverage expansion, affordability, comprehensiveness of coverage, and costs; A budget plan that does not increase the federal deficit, with supporting information;
Actuarial certifications and economic analysis to support the state’s estimates that the proposed waiver will comply with the comprehensive coverage requirement, the affordability requirement, and the scope of coverage requirement; andAnalyses of the waiver’s potential impact on provisions that are not waived, access to health care services when residents leave the state, and deterring waste, fraud, and abuse.
Periodic Reports: Under the proposed regulations, states with waivers would submit quarterly and annual reports. They would track measures in the four key areas: affordability, comprehensiveness of coverage, the number of people covered, and impact on the federal deficit.
Post-Award Evaluation: The proposed regulations suggest criteria that could be used in the evaluation of the waivers while they are in place.
Public comment is welcome on the State Innovation Waiver process outlined in this proposed regulation. To find the proposed regulation, visit www.ofr.gov/inspection.aspx.

Sources:

FACT SHEET: The Affordable Care Act: Supporting Innovation, Empowering States
Healthcare.gov

Healthcare Reform: Questions and Answers!

admin — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 17:28:14 +0000

Q: What are the new flexible spending account (FSA) limits? And can we offer these accounts only to our exempt employees because we have such high turnover among nonexempt workers?
A: Beginning January 1, 2013, FSA contributions for medical expenses will be limited to $2,500 per year, but cost-of-living adjustments will be made annually after that. Excluding nonexempt employees is likely to create plan discrimination in favor of ‘highly compensated’ employees. A safer solution would be to have a minimum service requirement for participation. Remember, though, that too long a requirement might also violate nondiscrimination requirements.
Q: What are the rules for ‘management carveouts’ in the healthcare law?
A: For all plan years on or after September 23, 2010, antidiscrimination rules that applied only to self-insured plans will also apply to fully insured plans, although not to grandfathered plans. A plan does not discriminate if it benefits 70 percent or more of all employees or 80 percent or more of all employees who are eligible to participate if at least 70 percent of all employees are eligible to participate. The only employees that may be excluded are those with less than 3 years’ service, those younger than 25, part-time or seasonal workers, and union workers whose collective bargaining agreements do not cover accident and health benefits.
Q: We have only 9 out of 36 employees classified as exempt; they are full-time and salaried. As a lawn and landscape services company, we don’t cover any workers except those 9 under our healthcare plan. If we lose our grandfathered status, must we cover as many as want to participate?
A: The answer will probably end up depending on whether all 27 of your other employees are considered part-time or seasonal. If some are not, and they are not offered coverage under the plan, you could be subject to a $100 per day excise tax under the Internal Revenue Code. Currently, though, small employers are exempt from this tax. If you provide health insurance coverage solely through a contract with an insurer and employ no more than 50 workers, you are still covered by the bar on discrimination but you may not be subject to a penalty for noncompliance. But that might be an oversight that will be corrected.
Q: I know that beginning in 2011, we need to include on employees’ W-2s the amount we have paid for their health benefits. Does this affect whether we’re allowed to deduct healthcare premiums before taxes?
A: Effective for tax years beginning after December 31, 2010, employers must report on Form W-2 the total cost of employer-provided group health coverage that is excluded from each employee’s gross income. The amount to be reported does not include funds excluded from income through an Archer MSA, a health spending account, or employee salary reductions to a flexible spending arrangement. This part of the law has no effect on pretaxing health insurance premiums.
Q. Can an employee’s adult child be covered on employee’s health plan if the child lives in his own home and files his own income taxes?
A. On and after March 30, 2010, both coverage under an employer-provided health plan and amounts paid or reimbursed under such a plan for medical care expenses of an employee’s child who has not attained age 27 as of the end of the employee’s taxable year are excluded from the employee’s gross income under IRC Sec. 105(b) and IRC Sec. 106. An employer may assume an employee’s taxable year is the calendar year. Previously, a child who was not a dependent had to be younger than either age 19 or age 24, if enrolled in school.
For this purpose, a child is the son, daughter, stepson, or stepdaughter of the employee, including those who are legally adopted or lawfully placed with the employee for legal adoption and “eligible foster children,” defined as individuals who are placed with an employee by an authorized placement agency or by judgment, decree, or court order. This provision applies to a child of the employee even if the child is not the employee’s dependent within the meaning of IRC Sec. 152(a). Thus, the age limit, residency, support, and other tests described in IRC Sec. 152(c) do not apply to a child for this purpose.
Q. A dependent under age 26 had coverage via his employer. The dependent lost his job, and has been offered COBRA. Can the parents still add the dependent?
A. Initially, it is important to note, that grandfathered plans (group health plans that were in existence on March 23, 2010) do not have to make coverage available to an adult child if the child is eligible to enroll in another employer-sponsored group health plan until plan years beginning on or after January 1, 2014. Thus, if the plan in your question is a grandfathered plan, it may exclude an adult child who has not attained age 26 from coverage only if the child is eligible to enroll in an employer-sponsored health plan (as defined in section 5000A(f)(2) of the Code) other than a group health plan of a parent.
Internal Revenue Code 5000A(f)(2) provides that:
Eligible employer-sponsored plan. The term ‘eligible employer-sponsored plan’ means, with respect to any employee, a group health plan or group health insurance coverage offered by an employer to the employee which is:
(A) a governmental plan (within the meaning of section 2791(d)(8) of the Public Health Service Act), or
(B) any other plan or coverage offered in the small or large group market within a State.
Although the regulations on the age 26 provision do not address whether an individual on COBRA is considered eligible to enroll in an employer-sponsored plan, the definition in Sec. 5000A(f)(2) states that it must be coverage that is offered by an employer to an employee. COBRA coverage, arguably, does not meet this definition. Thus, a strong argument could be made that an adult child may not be excluded before attaining age 26 based on the fact that the adult child has or is eligible for COBRA coverage.
Q. A plan has grandfathered status and excluded a dependent who is under the age of 26. If they change plans in January, do they lose grandfathered status?
A. The fact that the organization is changing health plans in January may not affect its grandfathered status. An amendment to the regulation on grandfather status allows employers to move to a new plan and maintain grandfather status if the change in plans does not result in a significant cost increase, a reduction in benefits, or other changes described in the original grandfather rule.
For more information, see the DOL’s fact sheet.
Q. Under ACA, if both parents have health plans with dependent coverage through their employers, what policy has to cover their 25-year old child?
A. In a situation where a young adult under the age of 26 is not eligible for employer-sponsored insurance and both parents have separate plans that offer dependent coverage, neither parent’s plan can deny coverage. Dual coverage will be allowed. (Note that beginning in 2014, children up to age 26 can stay on their parent’s employer plan even if they have another offer of coverage through an employer.)
Q. Can we charge employees extra for coverage of adult children up to age 26?
A. The healthcare reform laws prohibit special premiums for coverage of an adult child. The cost for the adult child must be the same as for other children. Some employers have structured their premiums based on the number of children an employee enrolls. Under these plans, an additional premium may be charged for an adult child, but it cannot be more than the amount charged for a minor child

ACA Insurance Mandate Provision Unconstitutional, Federal Judge Rules

admin — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 17:24:23 +0000

A second federal judge ruled that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) provision requiring most Americans to buy insurance is unconstitutional. In two other cases, federal judges have upheld the law. The issue will likely have to be resolved by the Supreme Court.
U.S. District Judge Vinson found that Congress exceeded its authority under the Commerce Clause by passing the ACA with an individual insurance mandate.
Furthermore, the judge wrote “because the individual mandate is unconstitutional and not severable, the entire Act must be declared void.”
The plaintiffs of the case included 26 states, the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB), and 2 private citizens.
Judge Vinson ruled in favor of the defendant, the Obama Administration, in one aspect of the suit. He found that the ACA’s expansion of the Medicaid federal-state insurance program does not violate the constitution.
White House officials declared that the ruling should not deter the rollout of the law. The Obama administration is “confident that the Affordable Care Act will ultimately be declared constitutional by the courts,” according to a White House blog.
The insurance mandate is scheduled to take effect in 2014. For more information on the ACA, visit Healthcare Reform: A Resource Center for Employers.
In Early December, a federal judge in Virginia also ruled the law’s requirement that most Americans obtain insurance surpassed the regulatory authority granted to Congress under the Commerce Clause.

Employee Handbook Checklist

admin — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 14:58:43 +0000

Employee Handbook Checklist

COBRA Record Keeping and Compliance Checklist

admin — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 14:57:58 +0000

COBRA Recordkeeping Compliance Checklist

FMLA Section 100 | Overview of Leave Law in Your Organization

admin — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 22:43:46 +0000

FMLA Section 100 Overview of Leave Law in Your Organization PDF

OVERVIEW

There are few day-to-day occurrences in the workplace that raise more legal, logistical, and financial questions than an employee’s request for leave. When such a request is made, the employer is faced with the loss of an employee and the accompanying effects on productivity, workflow, and morale. Compounding matters, the employer must navigate through a confusing—sometimes conflicting—maze of federal and state leave obligations in order to determine how to handle the leave request.

FMLA Section 200 | Basic Employer Requirements

admin — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 22:36:32 +0000

FMLA Section 200 Basic Employer Requirements, Coverage and Employer EligibilityPDF

BASIC REQUIREMENTS OF THE FMLA

This chapter will help you answer important questions about what the FMLA requires, which employersare covered, and when employees are eligible for FMLA leave.