Politics aside, there is a new Health Care Reform Law to be enacted over the next few years. I recently attended a webinar entitled “Health Care Reform Update and Review of Tax Implications”. The law is 2,700 pages, with over 9,000 pages of regulations. To say that maneuvering around this law will be difficult is an understatement.

As with most legislation,  there is a new list of acronyms to learn.

PPACA – Patient Protection & Affordable Care Act is the name of this new law. The goals of the law are noble and very much needed. It has been branded “ObamaCare” in many circles of late, for good or ill. It’s primary objectives are as follows:

• Cover the uninsured and underinsured.
• Make it easier to purchase health insurance.
• Increase insurance accountability.
• Create national health care standards.
• Standardize benefit packages.
• Reduce medical and insurance costs.

Here are a few of  the acronyms with which we will need to become familiar:

• MLR – medical loss ratio.
• SOB – summary of benefits.
• QHip – qualified health plan.
• EHB – essential health benefits.
• SBC – summary of benefits and coverage.

Various governmental agencies have had, and will likely continue to have, input into PPACA.

• U.S. Supreme Court.
• HHS – Health and Human Services.
• SSA – Medicare and Medicaid.
• DOL – Department of Labor.
• And of course….. the IRS.

There will be other interesting considerations implicit in the legislation  as well:

• Individual mandates.
• Medicaid expansion provisions.
• Medical necessity.
• Federally facilitated exchanges.
• Distribution rebates.
• Large and small employer tax penalties.
• Premium credits.
• Excise tax on “Cadillac” health plans.

There is a  great deal of misinformation, rumor and innuendo flying about regarding this legislation,  and that will likely accelerate  over the next few weeks as we ramp up to the election.

We suggest accessing www.healthcareexhange.com for reliable, unbiased information regarding the impact of this legislation on small business, and particularly on employers who manage their own payroll.

This informational site is maintained by Benefits Mall, the “preferred vendor” for all of Sage’s tax reporting services, and the entity that  owns CompuPay , who provides and maintains Peachtree’s payroll tax tables.