Category: HIPAA

Open Enrollment Compliance Reminders & Considerations

On By Michelle Turner, MBA, CEBSIn ACA, Cafeteria plans, COBRA, FSA, HIPAALeave a comment

Open enrollment can be a stressful time for employers. Planning well in advance and ensuring there is time to strategize and set new goals can help alleviate the missteps.

Open enrollment is also a perfect time to address compliance, especially this year with the relaxed regulations that many employers adapted based on their workforce needs.

Prior to open enrollment employers may also need to determine if changes made for the 2021 plan can or will continue in 2022.

Here is a list of open enrollment compliance reminders & considerations:

(Download checklist)

COBRA Beneficiaries

  • Are you notifying COBRA beneficiaries of election opportunities? The “Outbreak Period” has relaxed the timing for elections. Therefore, anyone who is still eligible to elect COBRA will need to receive the open enrollment materials.
  • COBRA beneficiaries have the same rights as similarly situated active employees.

Evergreen/Default Elections

  • How is your election process communicated?
  • Do your plan documents allow for evergreen elections?
  • If you offer an FSA, are you requiring an annual election?

ACA – Offers of Coverage

  • How are offers of coverage being documented?
  • Are you able to provide proof of employees who waive benefits?
  • If you are an ALE, can you confirm that at least one of the health plans offered satisfies the ACA’s affordability standard? (9.83% for 2021 plan years)

Are you providing the mandatory notices?

-CHIPRA                                          
-Medicare Part D
-Wellness Notices		-Summary of Benefits & Coverage (SBC)
-HIPAA Special Enrollment Rights
-HIPAA Privacy Notice		-WCHRA
-Initial COBRA Notice
-Notice of Patient Protections

Open Enrollment Guide

  • Is there a disclaimer indicating that if there are discrepancies between the open enrollment guide, summary plan description & plan document that the plan document will control?

⭐ TIP: Include language in the guide about it also being the Summary of Material Modification (SMM). This prevents the need to create a separate SMM. ⭐

Electronic Disclosure

  • If you are providing your documents electronically, do all employees use a computer as an integral part of their duties? If not, have you received affirmative consent to provide them electronically?

HIPAA Privacy

  • Enrollment data may be considered “PHI” under HIPAA.
  • Do you have a HIPAA Policy & Procedure manual?
  • Are business associate agreements in place?

Correcting/Changing Participant Elections

  • Pre-tax elections are irrevocable after the plan year has started unless the participant. experiences another permissible midyear change in status event (e.g., marriage).
  • Pre-tax elections are required by the IRS to be prospective in most situations.
  • Retroactive election changes are rarely permitted under the tax code.

If you have questions about the above or need help with an employee benefits administration question, please contact us. We would love to hear from you!

The Compliance Rundown is not a law firm and cannot dispense legal advice. Anything in this post or on this website is not and should not be construed as legal advice. If you need legal advice, please contact your legal counsel.

Cafeteria Plans Do Not Have to Permit Midyear Election Changes

On By Michelle Turner, MBA, CEBSIn Cafeteria plans, HIPAALeave a comment

Changes

Under an Internal Revenue Code Section 125 cafeteria plan, employee’s elections must generally be irrevocable until the beginning of the next plan year. In other words, employees are unable to make a change to their pretax elections made when newly hired or open enrollment unless they experience a permitted election change event (e.g. change in status) allowed under IRS rules (26 CFR § 1.125-4) and the event is recognized by the employers cafeteria plan.

Employers do not have to allow any exceptions to the irrevocable rule for pretax elections1.  However, the IRS does allow employers to design their cafeteria plans to permit employees to change their pretax elections prospectively2 when certain conditions are met.

NOTE: Section 125 permitted election changes are regarding pretax deductions to pay for benefits, not the actual enrollment (or disenrollment) in an insurance plan.

But I thought if an employee got married, or had a baby we had to let them enroll in our plan? 

It is true, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) requires group medical plans to permit midyear enrollment due to certain events (marriage, birth, adoption, loss of other group coverage etc.). The HIPAA special enrollment requirement is only for medical, it’s not required for excepted benefits, i.e. stand-alone dental, vision or most FSAs. (29 CFR § 2590.701-6)

NOTE: HIPAA is not a directive regarding how benefits are paid, it only mandates that an employee must be allowed to enroll in the medical plan. 

HIPAA special enrollment events are a subset of the Section 125 permitted election change events that provide special rights. Therefore, for practical matters, and to avoid requiring the premium to be taken post-tax, at a minimum, employers generally include HIPAA special enrollment events as permissible events allowing for a change to the pretax election, when designing their cafeteria plan3.

Footnotes:

1The irrevocable pretax election rules do not apply to health savings accounts (HSAs). Employees may prospectively change (start/stop, increase/decrease) their HSA contribution election at any time during the plan year. An employer must allow for changes at least monthly.

2Under HIPAA special enrollment (birth, adoption or placement for adoption) a retroactive pretax election change may be made. Likewise, if the plan has no waiting period (e.g. employees are eligible for coverage as of the first day of employment), employers may allow new employees to make a retroactive pretax election within 30 days of employment. However, if an employer has a waiting period (e.g. first of the month following date of hire, 30 days etc.) the new employee may only make a prospective election. (i.e. the effective date must be a date after the enrollment form was signed and submitted.)

3HIPAA requires group health plans, to give special enrollment opportunities for HIPAA specific events. Carriers are not required to incorporate all the election changes an employer may allow as permitted, by Treasury Regulations in Section 1.125. Therefore, employers with fully insured coverage, who recognize changes outside of what is required by HIPAA should confirm with their insurance carrier the group insurance contract and permissible cafeteria plan midyear change events are consistent.