Feds complete PPACA waiting period regs

Federal agencies also are giving employers some flexibility when it comes to offering group health coverage to rehired workers.

An employer cannot normally make the same worker go through a coverage waiting period more than once. But an employer that rehires a worker who has left can make the rehired worker go through another waiting period, as long as the employer did not fire and rehire  the worker to get around PPACA coverage requirements. 

Agencies also have weighed in on when group plans and other coverage providers can stop providing “certificates of creditable coverage.”

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) tried to help consumers who got sick move from one insurance plan to another by providing that any consumer who maintained creditable coverage could get some kind of coverage on a guaranteed-issue basis.

Some commenters told federal agencies that consumers no longer need creditable coverage certificates, because PPACA requires individual plans to sell coverage on a guaranteed-issue basis during open-enrollment periods.

Draft regulations issued in March 2013 required plans to continue to provide the certificates until the end of 2014, and regulators have decided to keep that requirement in place, to help consumers deal with any preexisting condition exclusions in pre-PPACA policies written in 2014.

See also:

• What’s ahead in 2014 for PPACA
• 8 reasons for employers to keep their PPACA guard up
• Feds draft group plan waiting period, exclusion regs