Practical HR Tips, News & Advice. Updated Daily.
By Gwen Cofield Governmental employers and the benefit plans they sponsor are generally exempt from the Employee Retirement Income Security Act’s (ERISA) Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA) provisions but are still required to offer COBRA coverage to qualified beneficiaries under the Public Health Service Act (PHSA).
After much back and forth, the EEOC just last week issued regulations letting companies offer lower health benefits to those age 65 and over than they do to those younger. Here’s the report on this important development, first published on our subscription website, HR.BLR.com. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has published a final […]
Wellness is well worth it, says Ron Keen, co-founder and President of PureWellness. That becomes easy to understand when you appreciate that lifestyle is the single largest factor in health, he says. If your entity is typical, Keen says, probably about 20 percent of your employees have diseases or medical problems that are not preventable. […]
The day after Charanjit Jutla agreed to pay $70,000 to settle a claim for unpaid wages by his nephew, Macan Singh, Jutla turned Singh over to immigration authorities. As a result, Singh-an undocumented worker-wound up in jail and is awaiting INS deportation proceedings. Now a federal judge in San Francisco has ruled that Singh can […]
by Michael H. Dell Morristown has joined the list of New Jersey cities that require employers to provide paid sick time to employees. Employers in Morristown have until January 11 to come into compliance with the city’s paid sick time ordinance, which was passed in September. Under the ordinance, employers with 10 or more employees […]
We reported in September on a federal appeal court ruling that Xerox Corp.’s pension plan improperly calculated lump-sum distributions from cash balance retirement accounts, resulting in lower benefits for certain employees who left the company between 1990 and 1999. Now Xerox has agreed to pay $239 million to settle the lawsuit, ending speculation over whether […]
If you and your employees are looking for valuable ways to donate to the Hurricane Katrina relief efforts, a new program launched by the Department of the Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service may help you out. In particular, the agencies have announced a program for employees to donate leave in exchange for employer cash […]
The latest increase in the minimum wage happens soon, and a big change in FMLA is in effect now, so you’d better have posters reflecting the changes (which include a new FMLA “poster insert”) in a prominent place. Here’s a low cost, worry-free way to take care of it all at once. Why think about […]
Employers that operate private airplanes for the use of their executives may want to stay tuned to some controversy over a recent IRS legal memorandum outlining the tax collector’s stance on aircraft management fees. The IRS shared its views on federal excise tax in Chief Counsel Advice Memorandum 201210026, which concludes that the tax applies […]
It’s no secret that the private pension system in the United States is in crisis. Last week, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC), which insures pensions for about 44 million Americans, announced that it has a startling deficit of $23 billion, fueled largely by having to take over pension plan liabilities of bankrupt airlines. But […]