US Labor Department to host Affordable Care Act webcast for employers and health plan service providers

The U.S. Department of Labor's Employee Benefits Security Administration will host a two-day compliance assistance webcast on Tuesday, Sept. 17 and Wednesday, Sept. 18 from 1 to 2:30 p.m. EDT each day. "The Affordable Care Act Compliance Assistance Webcast" will provide employers, brokers, third-party administrators and others with practical information, helpful tips and clarification on the new law. EBSA staff will be joined on the webcast by representatives from the Department of the Treasury and the Department of Health and Human Services.

 

On Sept. 17, Department of Labor staff will discuss the final wellness rules under the Affordable Care Act. The Department of the Treasury will discuss the employer shared responsibility provisions. 

 

On Sept. 18, the Department of Labor will present information on the Notice to Employees of Coverage Options under Fair Labor Standards Act 18B and the full implementation of key market reforms, including the extension of dependent coverage to age 26, lifetime and annual limits and prohibitions on pre-existing conditions. The Department of Health and Human Services will provide information on the new Health Insurance Marketplace and Small Business Health Options Program.

 

Participants can register to participate on Sept. 17 at http://ow.ly/oMrW1 and on Sept. 18 at http://ow.ly/oMs0z.

 

Source: DOL

 

This information is intended to be educational and should not be considered legal advice on any specific matter.

US Labor Department Hosts Affordable Care Act webcast

Online event designed to help workers and families understand new law

The U.S. Department of Labor's Employee Benefits Security Administration today announced an upcoming webcast. "The Affordable Care Act: How Will It Affect Me?" will take place Thursday, Aug. 29 from 1-2 p.m. EDT. EBSA staff will be joined on the webcast by colleagues from the Department of Health and Human Services.

The Department of Labor will discuss the impact of the Affordable Care Act on employment-based group health plans. The Department of Health and Human Services will provide information on purchasing coverage through the new Health Insurance Marketplace. The webcast will also cover new consumer protections that will become available in 2014.

Participants can register online.

Press planning to cover the webcast can coordinate with Mike Trupo or Laura McGinnis in the Department of Labor's Office of Public Affairs at the contact information above.

Source: DOL

This information is intended to be educational and should not be considered legal advice on any specific matter.

US Department of Labor provides additional assistance to former Northwest Georgia Regional Hospital workers

The U.S. Department of Labor today awarded a $502,569 National Emergency Grant increment to continue re-employment services for workers affected by the closure of the Northwest Georgia Regional Hospital in Rome, Ga. The facility, a state-run mental health hospital for developmentally disabled and mentally ill patients, closed in 2011.

"We will continue to provide much-needed assistance to help these workers upgrade their skills," said acting Assistant Secretary for Employment and Training Gerri Fiala. "The Department of Labor's funding provides support and opportunities for these workers to compete for the jobs of the future."
On July 29, 2011, a grant was approved for up to $3,750,000, with $1,120,427 released initially. The grant increment is being awarded to the Georgia Department of Labor to provide the workers with the training and support services needed to successfully find re-employment. This latest funding brings the total funds awarded for this project to $1,622,996. Additional funding up to the amount approved will be made available as the state demonstrates a continued need for assistance.

National Emergency Grants are part of the secretary of labor's discretionary fund and are awarded based on a state's ability to meet specific guidelines. More information is available at http://www.doleta.gov/NEG/.

Source: DOL

This information is intended to be educational and should not be considered legal advice on any specific matter.

US Department of Labor launches online retirement toolkit in cooperation with Social Security Administration, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services

The U.S. Department of Labor today announced the launch of an online toolkit to help workers identify key issues related to retirement planning. The department's Employee Benefits Security Administration developed the toolkit in cooperation with the Social Security Administration and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to help workers understand important decisions related to employment-based plans, Social Security and Medicare.
 
"This toolkit will provide workers with essential tools and information," said Assistant Secretary of Labor for Employee Benefits Security Phyllis C. Borzi. "By working together, our three agencies were able to create a comprehensive source for a diverse collection of resources that will help America's workers make informed decisions that are vital to their financial security throughout retirement."
 
The toolkit includes a timeline illustrating key decisions to be made about retirement benefits, Social Security and Medicare; general guidance; and a list of publications and interactive tools to assist with planning.
 
"Decisions about retirement are highly personal and depend on a number of circumstances," said acting Commissioner of Social Security Carolyn W. Colvin. "The retirement toolkit is a valuable source of information for people of all ages — it is never too early to start planning."
 
The retirement toolkit is available at www.dol.gov/ebsa/pdf/retirementtoolkit.pdf.

Source: DOJ

This information is intended to be educational and should not be considered legal advice on any specific matter.

Obama administration continues moving forward to implement health care law by releasing final rules on employment-based wellness programs

The U.S. Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor and the Treasury today issued final rules on employment-based wellness programs. The final rules support workplace health promotion and prevention as a means to reduce the burden of chronic illness, improve health and limit growth of health care costs, while ensuring that individuals are protected from unfair underwriting practices that could otherwise reduce benefits based on health status.

The final rules continue to support participatory wellness programs, which generally are available without regard to an individual's health status. These include programs that reimburse for the cost of membership in a fitness center; that provide a reward to employees for attending a monthly, no-cost health education seminar; or that reward employees who complete a health risk assessment, without requiring them to take further action.

The rules also outline standards for nondiscriminatory health-contingent wellness programs, which generally reward individuals who meet a specific standard related to their health. Examples of health-contingent wellness programs include programs that provide a reward to those who do not use, or decrease their use of, tobacco, or programs that reward those who achieve a specified health-related goal, such as a specified cholesterol level, weight, or body mass index, as well as those who fail to meet such goals but take certain other healthy actions.

Today's final rules ensure flexibility for employers by increasing the maximum reward that may be offered under appropriately designed wellness programs, including outcome-based programs. The final rules also protect consumers by requiring that health-contingent wellness programs be reasonably designed, are uniformly available to all similarly situated individuals and accommodate recommendations made at any time by an individual's physician, based on medical appropriateness.

The final rules will be effective for plan years beginning on or after Jan. 1, 2014.

The rule was issued May 29. To view the final rules, visit http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/.

Source: DOL

This information is intended to be educational and should not be considered legal advice on any specific matter.

Vermont and Utah Job Corps students combine skills to create awards honoring service of US Labor Department employees

Job Corps students and instructors from Vermont and Utah used recycling and sustainability in creating unique, handcrafted awards honoring the service and dedication of U.S. Department of Labor employees who are recipients of the 2013 Secretary of Labor's Honor Awards.

Annual Honor Awards represent the highest level of recognition used to acknowledge employees whose work and accomplishments achieved an outstanding level and demonstrated excellence in promoting the department's mission in goals set under the leadership of acting Secretary Seth D. Harris. This year's theme is "Then, Now, Next," symbolizing the 100 years that the U.S. Department of Labor has unwaveringly promoted the welfare of working Americans.

Job Corps centers competed to design this year's award. The winning design is an aluminum medallion hung from a metal "C" hook embedded into a wooden base with a matching centennial face plate affixed.

In a ceremony today, scores of Labor Department employees received awards in recognition of their exceptional efforts and outstanding displays of professionalism, teamwork and dedication. Issues ranged from preparing veterans to find good jobs and protecting the rights and wages of vulnerable workers to ensuring the security of retirement benefits and improving highway worker zone safety.

The department honored employees from numerous agencies, including the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Employee Benefits Security Administration, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the Office of Disability Employment Policy, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs, the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Policy, the Office of the Chief Financial Officer, the Veterans' Employment and Training Service, the Wage and Hour Division, the Women's Bureau, the Office of the Solicitor, the Mine Safety and Health Administration, the Bureau of International Labor Affairs, the Office of Workers' Compensation Programs, the Employment and Training Administration, the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Administration and Management, the Office of Inspector General, the Office of Labor-Management Standards and the Office of Public Affairs.

ETA's Job Corps is the nation's largest career technical training and education program for students ages 16 through 24. The program serves approximately 60,000 young people each year at 125 centers in 48 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.

Northlands Job Corps, Vergennes, Vt.

Under the direction of welding instructor Jim Blanchard, a Navy veteran, students from four Career Technical Training Programs – welding, carpentry, urban forestry and auto collision – decided to use recycled products from the past, present and the future (Then, Now, Next) for their creation.

Northlands Urban Forestry students, led by arborist instructors Jeremy Riemersma and David Gross and carpentry instructor Todd Lossman, removed several sustainably harvested brown maple trees from the Rokeby Museum property in Ferrisburgh, Vt. Students and instructors worked with cutting the lumber into wooden bases, which were sanded and finished.

Then students under the direction of welding instructor Tony Bosnich cut recycled pipe and used a plasma cutter and a gas tungsten arc welding process to produce the hook from which a medallion would be hung. After the assembly of the pieces, auto body instructor Sidney Messick and his students prepared the surfaces and used a spray paint coating for the finished product.

Past: harvested wood and reclaimed pipe
Present: welding, cutting and painting utilizing materials available
Future: developing skills for future craftsmen

Northland Job Corps students Dylan Vose, Victoria Finley, Omar Hutchinson, Timothy Hamlin, Marquis Benjamin, Samantha Burgess, Muhamud Jeilani, Daniel Quick, Jason Hubbard and Sage Gratton participated.

Clearfield Job Corps, Clearfield, Utah

Machining instructor David Howell assigned his students to create the medallion and centennial face plate using Feature Cam software. Once the design was approved, the students made a draft of the medallion and centennial face plate on a HASS CNC mill using both bronze and aluminum materials. Then students, under the supervision of welding instructors Roger Holcomb and Glenn Stott, used an Adira metal sheer to rough cut the scores of medallions and face plates into manageable pieces that were shaped, milled and given a hole at the top for display hanging. Clearfield Job Corps students Justin Blenheim and Alexander Galindo participated.

Source: DOL

This information is intended to be educational and should not be considered legal advice on any specific matter.

Free April 30 event to be co-hosted by US Labor Department

Webinar for college seniors, young workers to address managing student loans, saving for a secure financial future.

An April 30 webinar will provide tips and tools to help college seniors and young workers learn to budget for today's needs and tomorrow's goals. "Start Early to Take Charge of Your Financial Future" will be held from 3-4 p.m. EDT on Tuesday, April 30. Participants will receive practical guidance and resources to assist with budgeting, managing debt from student loans and credit cards, saving and investing for short and long-term goals, making the most of employer-sponsored retirement and health benefits, and other aspects of personal finance management.
 
"For those just starting their careers, there are a lot of demands on their income and retirement seems far away," said Assistant Secretary of Labor for Employee Benefits Security Phyllis C. Borzi. "However, by starting early and taking advantage of employer-sponsored benefits, young workers can take charge of their finances and begin to build retirement savings at a time in their lives when it will have the greatest impact."

The U.S. Department of Labor's Employee Benefits Security Administration will co-host the webinar with the U.S. Department of Education's Federal Student Aid office and the Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards as part of the Financial Literacy and Education Commission's Starting Early Campaign.

Members of the public can register at http://s.dol.gov/ZJ.

Source: DOL

This information is intended to be educational and should not be considered legal advice on any specific matter.

US Department of Labor releases Affordable Care Act study on self-insured plans

The U.S. Department of Labor today transmitted to Congress the third annual report on self-insured employee health benefit plans. The report, which is established by the Affordable Care Act, contains general information on self-insured employee health benefit plans and financial information on the employers that sponsor them.

Self-insured plans, unlike fully insured plans, are generally plans in which the sponsor retains the risk associated with paying covered health expenses, rather than paying a premium and transferring the risk to an insurance company. Some sponsors retain the risk for a subset of the benefits, but transfer the risk for the remaining benefits to health insurers – that is, they finance the plans' benefits using a mixture of self-insurance and insurance. Self-insurance is more common among larger sponsors, mainly because the health expenses of larger groups are more predictable and therefore larger sponsors face less risk.

This year's report utilizes a revised algorithm to identify self-insured plans from those that are fully-insured or use a mixed funding arrangement. These revisions, based on a study of Form 5500 filings, indicate that previous reports overstated the number of fully insured and mixed-funded health plans and identified too few self-insured plans. Consequently, this report is not directly comparable to its predecessors and should not be used with them to project trends in health insurance funding. Rather, estimates presented in the 2013 report should be viewed as the department's best estimates of plan funding arrangements for 2010 and earlier years.

Health benefit plans covering private-sector employees must file a Form 5500 Annual Return/Report of Employee Benefit Plan – generally, if they cover 100 or more participants or hold assets in trust. This report includes information on self-insured and mixed-insured health benefit plans that are required to file a Form 5500 and presents data on such plans for 2010, the latest year for which complete data are available. The department estimates that nearly 20,000 health plans filing a Form 5500 for 2010 were self-insured and approximately 4,000 were mixed-insured. These plans covered 30 million and 26 million participants respectively. However, because many self-insured health plans do not meet the filing requirements and therefore do not file the Form 5500, this report likely underestimates the total number of self-insured plans.

The full report can be found on the department's Employee Benefits Security Administration Affordable Care Act page, or at http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/healthreform/index.html#5.

Source: DOL

This information is intended to be educational and should not be considered legal advice on any specific matter.

Employee Benefits Security Administration to host Affordable Care Act webcast in Spanish

Online event will educate workers and families about new law

 

The U.S. Department of Labor's Employee Benefits Security Administration will host a free Spanish-language webcast, "The Affordable Care Act: Important New Protections for You and Your Family," on Wednesday, April 10, at 2 p.m. EDT.

The one-hour webcast will help workers of all ages and their families understand how the Affordable Care Act will impact their employment-based group health plans. It will cover protections under the ACA that improve health coverage, many of which are already in effect, including the extension of health coverage for dependents until age 26. The webcast also will discuss protections that will become available in 2014. In addition, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services will provide information on the new health insurance marketplace. Participants will have the opportunity to ask questions throughout the event and will receive contact information for future questions.

Register for the webcast online at:
http://mp163422.cdn.mediaplatform.com/163422/wc/mp/4000/15208/21710/24011/Lobby/default.htm?ref=ProductionTeamEmail.

• Read this news release en Español.

Source: DOL

This information is intended to be educational and should not be considered legal advice on any specific matter.

DOL issues final rules for multiple employer health care arrangements

New enforcement tools, streamlined reporting and disclosure to ensure security of health care coverage for consumers

The U.S. Department of Labor's Employee Benefits Security Administration today announced final rules under the Affordable Care Act to protect workers and employers whose health benefits are provided through Multiple Employer Welfare Arrangements. The final rules increase the department's enforcement authority to protect participants in MEWAs and call for such plans to adhere to enhanced filing requirements.

"A MEWA can be a means to offer benefits to workers where none other exists. But too often the individuals operating such arrangements take advantage of employers who want to make health insurance available to workers," said Assistant Secretary of Labor for Employee Benefits Security Phyllis C. Borzi. "Today's final rules give the department more tools to protect the employees of small companies that band together to purchase benefits."

A MEWA is an employee welfare plan or other arrangement through which multiple employers might seek to provide health care and other benefits to their workers. Employers are often told that MEWAs are more affordable than traditional forms of coverage, but unscrupulous promoters, marketers and operators of certain MEWAs have taken advantage of gaps in the law to avoid state insurance regulations, putting enrollees at financial risk. These actions include the requirement to maintain sufficient funding and adequate reserves to pay health care claims of workers and their families. EBSA has been involved in many cases where MEWAs have been operated by individuals who drained them of their assets through excessive administrative fees or outright embezzlement, leaving participants and their families with unexpected, unpaid health care bills. The Affordable Care Act includes provisions implemented by today's final rules that are designed to remedy these gaps.

The final rules authorize the secretary of labor to immediately issue a cease and desist order when it is apparent that fraud is taking place within a MEWA. The secretary could also seize assets from a MEWA when there is probable cause that the plan is in a financially hazardous condition. The final rules also require MEWAs to register with the Labor Department prior to operating in a state. To streamline the process, the department is making available a new, all-electronic filing system that also will serve as a searchable registry of MEWAs.

The final rules, and related changes to the Form 5500 Annual Return/Report, also enhance the department's ability to enforce Form M-1 filing requirements. This enhancement is achieved by requiring all employee welfare plans that file a Form M-1 to file a Form 5500 including information on compliance with Form M-1 filing requirements. Complete details on all provisions are included in the final rules and form revision notices, which will be published in the March 1 edition of the Federal Register. They can be read now at http:/www.dol.gov/find/20130228a/ (Ex Parte Cease and Desist and Summary Seizure Orders) and http://www.dol.gov/find/20130228b/ (Filings Required of Multiple Employer Welfare Arrangements and Certain Other Related Entities).

EBSA protects the retirement, health and other workplace-related benefits of America's workers and retirees, and their families. The agency oversees approximately 707,000 private sector retirement plans, 2.3 million health plans and a similar number of other benefit plans that cover more than 141 million Americans. Learn more at http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/. For more information about the Affordable Care Act, visit http://www.healthcare.gov/index.html.

Source: DOL

This information is intended to be educational and should not be considered legal advice on any specific matter.

Cleveland-based paint company sought tax breaks at expense of worker benefit plan

The U.S. Department of Labor has reached a settlement with the Cleveland-based Sherwin-Williams Co. that will provide $80 million to current and past participants of its Employee Stock Purchase and Savings Plan. The agreement is the result of an investigation by the department's Employee Benefits Security Administration into whether Sherwin-Williams, seeking to take advantage of tax breaks, improperly managed the plan in violation of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act. The settlement also requires Illinois-based GreatBanc Trust Co. to undergo an audit of its pension plan activities.

"Those who manage retirement plan assets are in a special position of trust and are required by law to always put the interests of plan participants ahead of anything else. That did not happen in this situation," said acting Secretary of Labor Seth D. Harris. "This agreement rightfully restores money to the workers who've played by the rules, done the right thing and worked hard to save for a secure retirement."

Said Assistant Secretary of Labor for Employee Benefits Security Phyllis C. Borzi, "When fiduciaries expend retirement plan assets, they have to act with undivided loyalty to the plan participants and make sure that the plan receives full value for its money. The fiduciaries' job is to manage plan investments to provide a secure retirement, not to help the plan sponsor secure tax breaks that are wholly disproportionate to the benefits actually provided to retirees."

The department's investigation focused on two transactions, one in 2003 and one in 2006, in which Sherwin-Williams and GreatBanc caused the plan to purchase specially designed stock issued by Sherwin-Williams solely for the purpose of the transactions. The investigation also looked at whether Sherwin-Williams had forwarded employee salary deferrals appropriately and promptly to their individual plan accounts.

To read the complete article, click here

Source: DOL

This information is intended to be educational and should not be considered legal advice on any specific matter.