BenefitScape® Releases FREE Tool to Help Employers File Their Massachusetts Health Insurance Responsibility Disclosure (HIRD) Form
NATICK, Mass. (PRWEB) November 12, 2018 -- All Massachusetts employers with six or more employees must submit a Health Insurance Responsibility Disclosure (HIRD) by November 30, 2018 as part of the Commonwealth’s Employer Medical Assistance Contribution (“EMAC”) legislation.
BenefitScape has introduced a new, easy to use tool to assist employers in completing the new HIRD form and complying with the EMAC legislation. The tool is available for download FREE at the company’s website.
This HIRD form collects information about employer-sponsored health insurance. Inaccurate information on the HIRD can lead to unnecessary penalties for the employer.
Why Does BenefitScape Offer this Massachusetts HIRD Help Tool?
“BenefitScape recognizes that employers can use some assistance in complying with these new reporting requirements” according to Kim Phillips, Customer Success Chief at BenefitScape, “Our clients want to avoid unnecessary penalties, and they know that the best way to do this is to make sure that any filings to Massachusetts are thorough, accurate, and timely.” “The HIRD form filing is not extensive but it can be complicated” continues Phillips “the major problem is that HIRD reporting is administered through the MassTaxConnect (MTC) web portal which is normally utilized by tax filing payroll experts. The information required on the HIRD form is not tax information but instead employee benefit data such as health plan provisions, eligibility rules, plan anniversary and will open enrollment deadlines; information that is not commonly known to tax filing experts.”
The correct answers for the HIRD filing require a benefits expert!
BenefitScape has solved this “translation” problem by creating the HIRD Help Tool, a fillable PDF HIRD template that can be used by the benefit expert to communicate the correct answers that must be entered by the tax expert on the web portal. The PDF is available here. This PDF is in the exact format of the web portal so that once completed the answers can be quickly and accurately entered by the tax or payroll user.
Why is preparing this HIRD form correctly important to employers?
This HIRD form collects information about employer-sponsored health insurance offerings. This data will be used by MassHealth to determine if an employee may be eligible for the MassHealth Premium Assistance. Inaccurate information on the HIRD can lead to unnecessary penalties for the employer and eligible employees not receiving potential premium assistance for their employer sponsored coverage.
If you would like to see a complete analysis of EMAC including the HIRD reporting requirements, please refer to our BLOG
BenefitScape has a long history working with state compliance programs including the initial implementation of the Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Authority (CCA) in 2006. We expanded our practice in 2014 to provide Affordable Care Act (ACA) Compliance solutions while continuing to monitor and assist our clients with state and local level compliance issues.
Ken Phillips, BenefitScape, http://www.benefitscape.com, 5086553307, [email protected]
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