State to delay health care reform provision deadline
Businesses may get a break under changes to the state's historic health care reform law passed last week.
Legislative "technical corrections" will reduce the number of forms needed to prove employees have been offered insurance. Other measures will tighten language and delay the launch of a provision that could force some employers to pay their employees' health care bills if those workers use the state's free care system.
The new health reform law passed over the summer is intended to make sure everyone in the state has insurance, through controversial measures such as mandating that everyone obtain some sort of health coverage. Technical corrections will be passed periodically in an effort to ensure the law kicks in as smoothly as possible.
Here are the changes:
- Legislators bumped from Jan. 1, 2007 to July 1, 2007, the deadline to comply with Section 125 of the new law, which requires employers with 11 or more employees to offer the ability to buy health insurance with pre-tax money. An extension gives insurers and the state's Connector program time to approve affordable plans individuals will be able to buy.
After July 1, employers will have to reimburse employees' health bills if those workers use the free care pool, as stated in the original law. Liability would kick in, for example, if one employee uses the free care system three times in a year or five employees use it.
Medical bills would also have to top $50,000 before an employer pays a $5,000 per week fine for every week he or she is late in filing paperwork on uncovered employees. In addition, the law requires an employer to reimburse the state for between 10 percent and 100 percent of medical bills if the business has not signed up to offer employees the right to buy insurance with pretax money.
- Paperwork will become easier for employers and insurers required to show who is covered by health insurance. Insurers now will be required to issue an annual tax form to members that states they have insurance, which will be attached to annual returns.
The original law mandated employers, insurers and individuals each report annually who is covered by insurance.
Eileen McAnneny, vice president of government affairs with Associated Industries of Massachusetts, worked with insurers to streamline the measure. She said the new language was necessary to avoid multiple interpretations.
Groups like AIM had opposed the free rider surcharge as harmful to small businesses, but others like the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce and the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation said the exceptions built in would ensure rare use of the surcharge.
Joan Fallon, spokeswoman for the state's Connector program, which is helping to shape the new insurance products, said officials expect the law will encourage businesses to avoid fines by offering insurance or giving employees the right to use pretax money to buy it.
The corrections don't change the $295 assessment per uninsured employee for businesses with 10 or more employees, which kicked in Oct. 1.
Businesses are expected to get a bill next year based on employee usage of the free care pool this year versus how many people enrolled in a health plan.
Legislators passed the 33-page technical corrections bill on Oct. 19 and it was expected to be signed any day.
Meanwhile, legislators have expressed concern that insurers and regulators will be able to meet deadlines set under the law.
All contents of this site © American City Business Journals Inc. All rights reserved.