Why Offer Employee Benefits

Here are the top 4 reasons to offer employee benefits:

1.  Attract New Employees: Employee benefits offer tax incentive to both the employer and employee.  Not to mention, the employee has access to better benefits for the price paid than they could with an individual policy.

2.  Maintain the Highly Qualified Employees:  As a company once you hire someone and they prove to be an asset to your company, you want to make sure they want to stay with you and not venture over to your competitors.  Employee benefits is a way to do this by offering great medical, dental, vision, life, 401k, etc.

3.  Improves Productivity:  Small firms are faced with difficult situations if even one of their employees has to go on sick leave.  When you offer health insurance, especially now that preventive care is covered at 100%, employees can stay on top of their health.  Through early detection, the employee can help to reduce the amount of sick leave they may need by hopefully stopping health problems prior to starting or by being able to start treating an illness before it becomes extremely serious.

4.  Tax Incentives:  By offering employee benefits, the employer can have substantial tax savings.  Also, if you meet the requirements for the Small Business Tax Credit you could be entitled to a percentage return of premium dollars spent.

If you want to explore offering EMPLOYEE BENEFITS or IMPROVING your current plans

call PrimeGroup Insurance Services (PGI) today:

561.578.6667

Palm Beach Post: "State won't enforce health law"

There was a great article on this morning's 1st page of the Palm Beach Post in regards to Florida's newest act in wanting to stop the Health Care Reform.  U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson declared that mandatory insurance is "unconstitutional;" therefore, Republican state officials have decided the "law is not in effect in Florida."  Read the article below....

"Health insurers that overcharge Florida consumers won't be required to issue rebate checks here, one of a raft of consequences emerging after a federal lower court judge declared the Affordable Care Act void.

Emboldened by Florida federal Judge Roger Vinson's decision that mandatory insurance is unconstitutional and the entire health act invalid, Republican state officials have taken the position that the law is not in effect in Florida.

As a result, they will not enforce a new rule requiring insurers to spend 80 to 85 percent of consumers' premiums on health care services.

They've snubbed $2 million worth of federal health reform planning grants meant to help states regulate their insurance industry and set up state-based insurance markets for individuals and small businesses.

It appears that Florida's stance leaves insurance companies to decide for themselves whether to comply with health reform rules.

Meanwhile, their counterparts in Indiana, Alabama, Arizona and other red states are asserting state's rights in a way not seen since the desegregation battles of the '60s.

In an exchange of letters and columns this week, the states have launched an orchestrated effort to slow, stop or remake health reform, in parallel with Congressional Republicans' threats to block health funding and swamp federal health agencies with document and hearing demands.

"We represent more than 115 million Americans," warned Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels in a Monday Wall Street Journal op-ed piece demanding greater state control over the state-based insurance markets. Twenty other governors signed on to his demands that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services give states more control...."

To read the rest of the article follow this link: http://tinyurl.com/PBPHealthLaw

BY: STACEY SINGER, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Great Healthy Living Websites

Since this blog is all about health, I thought it would be fun to share my favorite health websites.  I absolutely love looking at the following sites for great healthy recipes, fabulous exercises, inspiration music to download on my iPod to get me moving and grooving, so much more.  Here are some of my favorite sites:

http://www.self.com/

http://www.womenshealthmag.com/

http://www.eatingwell.com/

Top 10 Questions About the Small Business TAX CREDIT

1. Which employers are eligible for the small employer health care tax credit?

Small employers that provide health care coverage to their employees and the meet the following certain requirements:

                      1) Fewer than 25 full time equivalent employees for the tax year

                      2) Average annual earnings of its employees must be less than $50,000 per FTE

                      3) Employer must pay premiums under a "qualifying arrangement"

2. Can tax-exempt organizations be a qualified employer?

Yes.  However, special rules apply in calculating the credit for a tax-exempt qualified employer.  An employer that is an agency or instrumentality of the federal government, or of a State, local or Indian tribal government, is not a qualified employer unless it is an organization described in Code section 501(c) that is exempt from tax under Code section 501(a).

3. What expenses are counted in calculating the credit?

Only premiums paid by the employer under the arrangement meeting certain requirements (listed above) are counted in calculating the tax credit for small businesses.  For the years prior to 2014, only the premiums paid to a health insurance issuer will be counted.  Premiums for health care coverage that offer a wide scope of products such as major medical, dental and vision from one health insurance issuer can be counted.  However, if an employer offers medical separately from dental and/or vision then the employer must satisfy the requirements for each type of coverage. 

If the employer only pays part of the premium costs while the employee covers the rest, the employer may only count the portion they have paid in calculating the tax credit.

4. What is the average premium  for the small group market in a state (or an area within the state)?

The average premium is determined by the Department of Health and Human Services.  This department sets the average premium for the small group market in each state for the tax year.

5.  What is the maximum credit for a qualified employer (other than a tax-exempt employer)?

For tax years beginning in 2010 through 2013, the maximum tax credit issued will be 35% of the employer's premiums paid.

6.  What is the maximum credit for a tax-exempt employer?

For tax years beginning in 2010 through 2013, the maximum tax credit issued will be 25% of the employer's premiums paid.

7. Can premiums paid by the employer in 2010, but before the new health reform legislation was enacted, be counted in calculating the credit?

Yes.  All qualified premiums paid by the employer may be counted for 2010.

8. How is the amount of average annual wages determined for purposed of qualifying for the small business tax credit?

The amount of average wages is determined by first dividing the (1) total wages paid by the employer during the employer's tax year to employees taken into account by (2) the number of employer's FTEs for the year.

9. Can an employer with 25 or more employees qualify for the credit if some of its employees are part-time?

Yes they can because the limitation on the number of employees is based on the FTEs.  So if some of the employees are part-time the employer could possibly still qualify.  For example, an employer with 46 part-time employees (1,040 hours of time) has 23 full time employees and can qualify.

10. If the owner of a business also provides services to it, does the owner count as an employee?

Generally, no.  A sole proprietor, a partner in a partnership, a shareholder owning more than 2% of a S corporation, and any owner of more than 5% of other businesses are not considered employees for purposes of the credit.  Thus, the wages or hours of these owners is not calculating in determining the FTEs or the annual wages as well as the premiums paid on behalf of this person.