Federal agencies have decided that the new Affordable Care Act group health nondiscrimination rules are too complicated for taxpayers to apply without regulatory guidance.
Taxpayers can wait to comply with the rules until the agencies come out with regulations or some other type of guidance, officials at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) say in IRS Notice 2011-01.
The rules are supposed to discourage employers from using health plans that offer richer benefits to high-paid individuals than to other individuals.
Section 10101(d) of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), a component of the Affordable Care Act package, created the nondiscrimination rules by adding Section 9815(a)(1) to the Internal Revenue Code and Section 715(a)(1) to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act.
A non-grandfathered insured group health plan that fails to comply with the rules could be subject to an excise tax of $100 for each day of noncompliance per individual, officials say.
A non-grandfathered self-insured plan that fails to comply could lose tax benefits.
