Even with the February 10 announcement that the Affordable Care Act’s employer mandate will be pushed back until the start of 2016 for employers with between 50 and 99 employees, companies across the U.S. are still trying to understand how to make the landmark health care law work for them rather than against them. One section of the law—the ACA’s whistleblower provisions—might have escaped employers’ notice, but it could have an important impact on their Obamacare rollout calculus.
In order to sidestep the employer mandate and the penalties that go along with its violation, said Rachel Cutler Shim, an attorney in the Tax, Benefits & Wealth Planning Group at Reed Smith, some businesses are trying to cut employee time at work down to less than 30 hours a week. Reducing hours would make fewer employees qualify as full-time, thus bringing the company below the 50-employee threshold at which the mandate kicks in.
