If you're looking into ICHRA administration, you're probably considering offering an ICHRA to your employees. (Great choice, by the way). The individual coverage health reimbursement arrangement (ICHRA) gives employers the ability to design and customize a plan that’s tailor-made for their organization. The right ICHRA administration platform will save you time, energy, and headaches.
ICHRA Administration
The many rules surrounding ICHRA and other HRAs can change year over year. Most of these rules are in place to prevent discrimination. If keeping up with changing regulations sounds overwhelming, take heart! A good ICHRA administration tool should have built-in, automatic updates to ensure compliance.
Let's check out what to look for when it comes to ICHRA administration.
What our ICHRA administration software offers
As you evaluate ICHRA providers, keep these things in mind! Here's a step by step guide to enlisting an ICHRA administrator and getting started.
Step-by-step help in designing your ICHRA
Our platform makes reimbursing your employees simple and easy. It will save you time and money, and provide you peace of mind.
The platform navigates users through:
- employee class options - ICHRA offers 11 different classes for employees, allowing freedom, flexibility and greater budget control
- reimbursement rates - ICHRA allows employers to vary reimbursements based on family size, hours worked, and location
- what to reimburse - health insurance premiums and/or qualified medical expenses (the list is long!!)
- waiting periods
- start dates
- and provides legal plan documents, employee onboarding, receipt tracking, compliance monitoring, and tax reporting.
If you're a large employer (ALE), you can also upload a census and we will run a free affordability analysis for you to ensure that you remain compliant. (These can change year to year, by the way.)
84% of our clients spend less than an hour per month administering their HRA.
ICHRA software should include the following features:
- Legal plan and summary plan description (SPD).
- A means of collecting and storing employees’ electronic signatures.
- Privacy features that ensure the company does not view employees’ protected health information (PHI).
- ERISA compliance.
- Documentation regarding appeal requirements, notifications, and procedures.
- Continued coverage of dependent children up to age 26.
- Automated notice requirements for employees’ eligibility and annual allowance.
If a traditional group plan is being replaced by an ICHRA, it's important to make the transition as smooth and easy as possible for your employees. Give them the resources they need for them to choose their own plan stress-free. Our data-driven platform can help your employees search for plans based on their needs, their doctors and their prescriptions.
ICHRA administrators should include the following employee features:
- Robust on-boarding and online support.
- An employee welcome letter and other employee communications.
- Resources to help employees decide which policy to purchase.
- Online and mobile access to their account with instant receipt upload feature.
- HSA compatibility.
- A simple way for employees to make reimbursement requests.
- A way for employees to track reimbursements over time.
ICHRA should be simple for employers and benefits consultants
Whether you're the plan administrator on staff or a benefits consultant helping a client, an ICHRA administration tool should make it easy to manage the ICHRA, track reimbursements, and comply with all reporting requirements.
Key features include:
- Easy setup
- Support for understanding affordability and premium tax credits and how those affect employees.
- Cloud-based account access.
- Real-time access to accounting information.
- An easy way to manage employee enrollment in the ICHRA.
- A way to track and record reimbursements (and send automatic notice of reimbursement decisions to employees).
- Online, automatic annual renewal.
Need help with ICHRA administration?
Call us biased, but we think our Take Command ICHRA Administration tool is the way to go! Is your company or client going to be a part of this exciting change? Chat with our team with any questions you may have about these new, tax-friendly benefits or check out our new ICHRA Guide for more information on its background, setup process, requirements, and rules.
Additional resources →
- Learn about ICHRA Classes
- Learn about ICHRA Requirements
- Learn about ICHRA Regulations
- Learn about ICHRA Plan FAQs
- Learn about our ICHRA administration platform
Keely S.
A wife to one and mother to four, Keely does all of the things. She’s also dabbled in personal finance blogging and social media management, contributed to MetroFamily magazine, and is passionate about good food, treasure hunting and upcycling. With a B.S. in Psychology from the University of Oklahoma and a knack for a witty punchline, it’s no surprise that Keely’s social posts are as clever as they get. In her (very little) free time, you’ll find Keely with her nose in a book or trying out a local restaurant with her family.