Very recently I had a conversation with the COO and CFO of a client regarding a top candidate who had turned down an offer. They were shocked and confused. They had offered the candidate the compensation she requested and had thrown in a few small perks, but it unfortunately wasn’t enough to seal the deal. Ultimately that candidate (who had multiple offers on the table) accepted another offer. Why?

Q: Does an employer’s cash-out option (i.e., cash-in-lieu of benefits) have any impact on the coverage’s affordability under the employer mandate? A: Yes. As background, under the employer mandate, the employer must offer at least one affordable, minimum value plan to all full-time employees, or risk a penalty. Affordability is based on the cost to the full-time employee for single-only coverage. Generally speaking, coverage is affordable if the cost of single-only coverage does not exceed 9.5 percent of that employee’s W2 wages or 9.5 percent of that employee’s rate-of-pay. (There is also a way to determine affordability based on the federal poverty line.)

On Aug. 11, 2015, the IRS published a draft version of Publication 5223, General Rules and Specifications for Affordable Care Act Substitute Forms 1095-A, 1094-B, 1095-B, 1094-C and 1095-C.

By now you are probably overloaded with all the changes and deadlines that fall under the Affordable Care Act. As we muddle through all these rulings, there always seems to be a new regulation associated with it that we either did not know about or the information is vague. One that recently came to my attention was the fines businesses can incur if they reimburse employees for individual non-group health plans.