On June 10th Governor Rendell signed into law the state’s Mini COBRA (Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act) legislation. Effective July 10 employers who employ 2-19 employees will now be required to offer health insurance continuation post employment and also will be obligated to comply with the Federal subsidy of COBRA under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).

Mini-COBRA will mirror the federal COBRA regulations in many ways. Highlights of the Mini-COBRA provisions include:

• Requires employers who employ 2-19 employees and offers health insurance to offer COBRA -- self-insured plans are not covered
• Only applies to Medical Plans (does not include HRAs, FSAs, dental, or vision)
• To be eligible, an employee must have been on the employer’s insurance for at least 3 months prior to the qualifying event
• COBRA qualifying events remain the same as those under Federal regulations
• Eligible for COBRA coverage lasting up to 9 months
• The Insurer is responsible for sending out required notices and forms to eligible employees and covered dependents. Employers simply must notify the plan administrator within 30 days when a covered person experiences a qualifying event. The covered person then has 30 days to make his or her election. The plan administrator then has 14 days to notify the insurer of the beneficiary's election.
• Assistance Eligible Individuals are included in State COBRA
• The 65 percent subsidy is advanced by the Insurer (not the employer, as ARRA mandates for COBRA).
• Administrators may charge up to 105% of the medical premium to COBRA enrollees.
• Timeline for getting out notices differs from federal COBRA
  

The state plan lacks the lookback feature of the federal COBRA Subsidy program in that only individuals terminated on or after July 10th will be eligible to participate. The federal program, enacted in February, allowed participation of individuals separated back to September of 2008.

In the same signing ceremony as COBRA, Governor Rendell also enacted a law requiring continued health coverage for dependents until attainment of age 30.

This regulation will allow uninsured, single, adult children up to age 30 to be covered by their parents’ health insurance plan. Parents must pay the premiums and the coverage hinges on the employers’ willingness to offer the benefit to parents.

Additional requirements for continuation are that the dependent:

• Is not married.
• Has no dependents.
• Is a resident of this Commonwealth or is enrolled as a full-time student at an institution of higher education.

Is not provided coverage as a named subscriber, insured, enrollee or covered person under any other group or individual health insurance policy or enrolled in or entitled to benefits under any government health care benefits program.

If you have questions about the new legislation, please contact Kathy Mills at 610-797-9000, extension 308.

Current I-9 Remains Valid

Employers should continue using the I-9 employment eligibility verification form currently on the Department of Homeland Security's Citizenship and Immigration Services (“CIS”) web site despite the form's stated expiration date of June 30, the agency said June 26. The new version of the I-9 form is still under review at the Office of Management and Budget. While OMB reviews the new form, the current I-9 form will not expire, CIS said.

The Immigration and Nationality Act requires that employers complete an I-9 for all newly hired employees to verify their identity and authorization to work in the United States. The current version of the I-9 form was released February 2, 2009 providing that only unexpired documents can be accepted and eliminating certain documents that are no longer issued by CIS.

CIS will update the I-9 form when OMB completes its review, the agency said. At that time, employers will be able to use either the form with the new revision date or the current form with the February 2, 2009, revision date, according to the agency.

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