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Employee benefits include health, dental, vision, life, and disability insurance with the insurance premiums paid partly or entirely by the employer as well as pension and retirement benefits. Employers generally don't have to offer any employee benefits to their employees. Some jobs come with benefits and some do not.
If you do provide employee benefits to your employees, however, you must follow certain rules. The federal law that regulates health benefits and retirement benefits is called "ERISA". It is very complex, so you might want to contact an attorney who specializes in employment law if you have a question or problem with providing benefits.
- Do I have to offer health benefits?
- How do I offer health benefits?
- Must all employees get the same health benefits?
- Cancellation of health insurance benefits
- Retirement benefits
Do I have to offer health benefits?
Employers usually don't have to offer health benefits, even to their full-time workers. But, if you do give health benefits, you must make good on your promises to pay the employee's premiums. Also, you may require the employee to contribute part of the premium - as long as the employee knows that's part of the deal.
How do I offer health benefits?
Although some employers are "self insured" (meaning that they handle their own health insurance plans), most contract with health insurance companies to handle their health insurance plans. In that case, the employer pays the insurance company to handle claims from the employees, and the insurance company usually makes payments directly to the employees for medical expenses.
Must all employees get the same employee health benefits?
Normally, no. You may choose to give some employees better health benefits than others, as long as your decision is not based on unlawful discrimination - such as deciding not to give disabled workers any benefits.
Cancellation of health insurance benefits
You can't just drop your health insurance plan without notice. You must let your employees know ahead of time. If you give notice that you are going to drop your insurance plan, you should give as much advance to the employees as possible so that they can get necessary replacement health care as soon as possible - before your health insurance plan ends.
If you don't drop the entire health insurance plan, but merely drop an individual employee from the plan (e.g. the employee is terminated or on an extended leave of absence), the employee might be entitled to continue his/her health insurance benefits anyway - under a law called "COBRA". If this happens, you should talk to a lawyer to avoid a claim from the employee that the employee was "singled out" due to something like the employee's race or disability, etc. If you have questions about employee benefits, consult with a business lawyer in your area.
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