BASE^® Blog

It has been a full year since the Excepted Benefit HRA has been available for businesses.  Unlike the name suggests, the EBHRA offers much more than just the reimbursement of “excepted benefits” in ways of INTEGRATION, DESIGN, & ELIGIBILITY.

The BASE® Excepted Benefit HRA (EBHRA) allows employers, who offer a group health plan, to reimburse employees an additional $1,800 for premiums paid towards excepted benefits that are not included in a traditional group health plan.  Some excepted benefits are COBRA, dental, vision, short-term medical plans, and other qualifying out-of-pocket medical expenses.

The BASE® EBHRA is available to businesses of ALL sizes looking to maximize tax benefits for their business while expanding the benefit package for their employees.  This HRA is for employees that have been offered the employer-sponsored group health plan but are not required to enroll to participate in the EBHRA.

In 3 ways the EBHRA offers more:

INTEGRATION:

While other HRAs, such as the Individual Coverage HRA (ICHRA) and Integrated HRA, must integrate with either an individual health insurance plan or the employer-sponsored group health plan, the EBHRA does not.  The sponsoring employer MUST OFFER the EBHRA in conjunction with the employer-sponsored group health plan, however, the employees are not required to enroll in the group health plan to participate in the EBHRA. 

Simply put, if the employer wants to provide the EBHRA to their employees, they must offer an employer-sponsored group health plan.  It is up to their employees if they want to participate or not.

DESIGN:

The EBHRA is designed for uniform availability meaning it must be offered on the same terms and conditions to all eligible employees.  The employer gets to determine what expenses to reimburse and how much will be reimbursed up-to the maximum of $1,800 (indexed for inflation) per plan year to employees. 

Simply put, the employer must provide the EBHRA to all employees, but can choose how much they will provide up-to $1,800. 

ELIGIBILITY:

Final regulations leave the assumption that the employees eligible for the EBHRA must be eligible to enroll in the employer-sponsored health plan, even if they choose not to.

Simply put, the employees must be eligible for the employer-sponsored group health plan, but do not need to enroll to take advantage of the tax savings with the EBHRA. 

With the EBHRA, we want you to experience the BASE® Difference!  With BASE®, employers will have an additional way to maximize their tax benefits for the business and their employees, by providing a tax-free means of paying for COBRA, Short-Term Limited Duration Insurance, and Excepted Benefit Insurance and/or IRC Section 213(d) medical expenses.  Employees will have up-to an additional $1,800, tax-free, to apply towards these benefits.

Simply put, the EBHRA can offer benefits to both the employer and employee, allowing both to maximize their tax savings.  For more information, call BASE® at 888.386.9680 or visit www.BASEonline.com.

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We can’t help but CHEER when an employer saves valuable tax dollars, provides an expanded benefits package, and helps their employees pay for their health care expenses with BASE® HRAs!

HIP, HIP, Hooray for HRAs!

Health Reimbursement Arrangements are an IRS-approved tax savings plan that allows employers to reimburse employees for certain health care costs, are non-taxable to the employee, and are 100% deductible to the employer as a business deduction.

The BASE® Section 105 HRA allows small business owners, classified as Sole Proprietor, Partnership, or C or S Corp, to deduct up-to 100% of health care costs, including individual insurance premiums and qualified out-of-pocket (OOP) health care expenses.  This plan is applicable to small business owners that can legitimately hire their spouse.

HOORAY…with the Section 105 HRA, employers can save up to $5,900 annually and reduce the high costs of health insurance premiums and OOP health care expenses.

The BASE® Integrated HRA allows employers, who sponsors a high-deductible group health plan, to lower the cost of premiums while keeping the employees’ coverage the same, and supplement deductible costs.  

HOORAY…with the Integrated HRA, employers can reduce group health plan premiums by 10-50% and the overall cost of the insured plan.

The BASE® Qualified Small Employer HRA (QSEHRA) allows employers, with less than 50 full-time employees who maintain minimum essential coverage (MEC), to reimburse qualified health insurance premiums or qualified health care expenses within the annual limit set by the IRS.

HOORAY…with the QSEHRA, employers can control health care costs with set allowance caps and save money by not providing a traditional group health plan.

The BASE® Individual Coverage HRA (ICHRA) allows employers to reimburse employees for qualified insurance premiums and/or non-insured health care expenses.  Employers can offer all employees, or to a specific class, with no contribution caps.

HOORAY…with the ICHRA, employers can streamline benefit options and cut costs without reducing the value of the benefits plan and save money by not providing a traditional group health plan to any or all employees.

The BASE® Excepted Benefit HRA (EBHRA) allows employers, who offer a group health plan, to reimburse employees an additional $1,800 for premiums paid towards excepted benefits.

HOORAY…with the EBHRA, employers have another way to maximize savings and tax benefits.

So, “HIP, HIP, HRA” and cheer for what HRAs can do for businesses of all sizes and structures!  For more information, call BASE® at 888.386.9680 or visit www.BASEonline.com.

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A Flexible Spending Account (FSA) is considered one of the most underutilized tools to help both the employer and employee save on taxes each year.  Because many don’t understand it, they don’t think they are worth the “hassle.”  So, is it worth incorporating into the employer-sponsored benefits plan?

The BASE® Flexible Spending Account (FSA) is an IRS-approved tax savings plan that provides employees with the option to pay for out-of-pocket health care expenses not covered by insurance on a tax-free basis.  The BASE® FSA is another means for an employee to pay for their out-of-pocket health care expenses and a way for an employer to maximize their tax savings.

Not only is it a no-hassle plan, but it saves both the employer and employee valuable tax dollars.  The following example shows just how valuable and why it would be worth it to invest in this benefit plan.

Daniel owns a Construction Company with 22 employees, with a group health plan in place.  He calls BASE® and sponsors a Flexible Spending Account.  Let’s take a look at one of his employees, Laura, and how much she could save by enrolling in the business’ FSA.  For both examples, Laura is paid a yearly income of $40,000.

WITHOUT the FSA, all her income will be taxed at 27.65% which is $11,060 in taxes taken out of her paycheck.  On top of that, Laura has $2,000 in unexpected health care expenses incurred throughout the year.  At the end of the year, Laura is left with $26,940 in her pocket.

WITH the FSA, Laura chooses to elect to put $2,000 into her FSA on a pre-tax basis to pay for those unexpected health care expenses incurred throughout the year.  Her taxable income is now $38,000, taxed at 27.65%, which is $10,507 in taxes taken out of her paycheck.  At the end of the year, Laura is left with $29,493 in her pocket.

Laura’s income is $26,940 WITHOUT the FSA and $29,493 WITH the FSA.  Without doing anything but electing to put her money that she would already use to pay for her health care expenses into her FSA on a pre-tax basis, Laura will save $2,753.  For Daniel, if half of his employees elected to do what Laura did, Daniel could save $1,683 a year, just by having 11 employees simply elect to put their money into an FSA.

By electing to enroll into the BASE® FSA, employees can realize more benefits than just saving hundreds, if not thousands, in valuable tax dollars each year.  With the funds being transferred on a pre-tax basis, employees save on federal, state, Social Security, and Medicare taxes, increasing their take-home pay.  Employees can choose to utilize the online portal, mobile app to easily report their medical expenses, or use our FSA debit card to pay for their qualifying expenses directly to simplify the payment/reimbursement process.

By electing to sponsor the BASE® FSA, employers can realize more benefits than just saving hundreds, if not thousands, in valuable tax dollars each year.  Employers can enhance their benefits package by providing their employees a means to pay for their health care costs, and even though the employees are electing to contribute their funds on a pre-tax basis, this helps to reduce the employer’s share of the FICA and FUTA taxes.  Employers have options for increased plan participation and savings by offering a variety of reimbursement methods, including the mobile app or debit card.

The BASE® FSA is worth more than the tax savings and what the employee takes home in the paycheck.  For more information, call BASE® at 888.386.9680 or visit www.BASEonline.com.

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