BASE^® Blog

Each year the cost of health care is on the rise and each year a business looks for better ways to manage these costs while still providing the best benefits to their employees.  According to the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), employer health care costs in 2019 are expected to experience about a 6% hike from 2018.  A great way to offset this increase is by implementing a Health Reimbursement Arrangement from BASE®!  Tax-advantaged benefit plans, like the HRA, are an easy and inexpensive way to provide better benefits.

There are a variety of HRAs to meet the needs of today’s business owners.  Whichever HRA a business chooses will depend on what type of business structure, how many full-time employees, and whether or not group insurance is provided.  BASE® recognizes that each business has different needs and has fully customizable plans that help employers save money.  Employers can pass that savings onto their employees to save on out-of-pocket health care expenses.

BASE® Offers a Variety of HRA Plans: 

The 105 HRA allows small businesses, such as the owner who can legitimately hire their spouse, the opportunity to deduct up-to 100% of health care costs as a business deduction, including individual insurance premiums and other qualified out-of-pocket medical expenses.  The average client saves over $5,000 in tax savings.  It can be administered to a wide variety of businesses such as any business classified as a sole proprietor, partnership, C Corp, or S Corp.

The Integrated HRA is available to employers with a group health insurance plan in place looking to reduce the overall cost of insurance coverage and enhance their current benefit package.  Employers are able to suppress the yearly increase associated with health care, and help employee pay for medical expenses not covered by health insurance.  The employer raises the deductible on their current health insurance plan, while self-insuring a portion of that deductible with the HRA to keep the employees’ responsibility of the deductible maintainable.  This plan has been known to reduce the client’s health insurance premium increases by 10-50%.

The QSE HRA allows employers to offer an attractive benefits package without offering health insurance.  The employees have the ability to secure their own medical insurance either on or off the marketplace, and use the QSE HRA funds to pay for insurance premiums, co-pays, deductibles, eye and dental care, or other qualified health care expenses.  This plan requires an employer to have less than 50 full-time employees, not offer a group health plan to any employees, and employees must provide proof of Minimum Essential Coverage (MEC).

Not every single plan works with every business, but BASE® can work with employers to get the custom plan needed to save the most tax dollars.  For more information, please call BASE® at 1-888-386-9680 or visit www.BASEonline.com. 

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