The other day we fielded the following question for one of our clients. And we thought the answer could help a lot of people, so we're publishing it here...
We only have 30 employees. How does the Affordable Care Act affect us?
And the exact response from one of our ACA Subject Matter Experts:
Hi ________,
You asked how ACA affects you if you have less than 30 employees. Unless your company is owned under common ownership with other companies, your employee count means you are not an Applicable Large Employer. Therefore, you do not have to offer affordable health care coverage to your full time employees and you have no additional payroll reporting required due to the Affordable Care Act. So for the most part, you are off the hook!
If you find that your company is owned under common ownership with other companies, you would be required to consider employees in all related companies to determine whether together, you are an Applicable Large Employer.
Below is a link to a very user-friendly website provided by the IRS that will answer many questions about the Affordable Care Act and how to measure employees.
There are some smaller, less well known aspects to the Affordable Care Act that affect all employers. These include collecting additional Medicare tax on employees wages over $200,000 in a tax year and for some employers, reporting the value of provided health coverage on the employees' W2. The following link on the IRS website is specifically geared to answer ACA questions for small employers:
I hope this helps answer your question. Just let us know if we can be of further assistance.
Thank you and have a great day!
Sincerely,
Kelley
P.S. That's Payroll Country! ;-)
Check out our ACA Toolbox if you're interested in more resources to help you with ACA Compliance.