The COBRA Advisor can help you determine your compliance with key requirements under the federal Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act, including requirements related to:
COBRA generally requires group health plans with 20 or more employees in the prior year to offer continuation coverage to covered employees, former employees, spouses, former spouses, and dependent children when group health coverage would otherwise be lost due to certain specific events.
HR360’s new attorney-developed Federal & State Mini-COBRA Chart explains the continuation of benefits requirements that apply under both federal and state law. For employers with 19 or fewer employees, many states have their own mini-COBRA, or state continuation of benefits, requirements.
Make sure you know your mini-COBRA obligations by downloading the attorney-developed chart at the link below.
A well-developed job description will help you review employee performance, and hire the best candidates. Our ‘Custom Job Description Builder’ tool is so simple to use. With our efficient job description tool, you can transform a blank page into a professionally-developed job description in minutes. Just follow these simple steps:
Job descriptions are such an important tool for your employees and increasing their contributions to your business, but developing them can be stressful. The Job Description Builder helps you make the most complete job description so your employees can achieve their true potential while at the same time contribute to the success of your business.
With the ‘Employee Cost Calculator’, you can get a complete picture of the true cost of hiring a new employee (labor burden estimator). From compensation and benefits to recruiting, training, office equipment and other costs, this easy-to-use calculator accounts for those typical expenses you may not necessarily think about when hiring a new employee. Simply use the default values provided or enter your own numbers to come up with an effective hourly rate for your prospective employee.
The ‘Employee Benefits Benchmarking’ tool provides detailed information about access to and participation in various benefits, broken out by worker and industry characteristics. The data is presented as the percentage of employees who have access to or participate in certain benefits or as average benefit provisions – for example, the average number of paid holidays provided to employees each year.
We have benchmark survey results for Benefit Combinations, Healthcare Benefits, Life, Short-term Disability, and Long-term Disability Insurance Benefits, Other Benefits, Paid Time-off Benefits and Retirement Benefits.
The employee handbook is one of the most important communication tools between a company and its employees. Not only does it set forth your expectations for your employees, but it also describes what they can expect from the company. Regardless of size, all employers should consider creating an employee handbook to make their company’s policies accessible to employees. Your employee handbook should be as clear and unambiguous as possible, and written in an understandable language.
The FMLA Advisor is designed to help employers understand their rights and responsibilities under the federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA). Under the law, eligible employees of covered employers are entitled to take unpaid, job-protected leave for:
The FMLA Advisor can assist you in understanding:
The ‘Interview Question Builder’ is key to evaluating whether a candidate has the knowledge, skills, and qualities necessary to become a successful employee. In a structured interview, the same questions should be asked to all candidates. The structured interview improves reliability and validity by using the same job-related questions for each candidate. The strength of this type of interview is that all candidates receive the same treatment, interview questions are directly linked to job behaviors.
The ‘Multi-State Law Comparison Tool’ is the easy, convenient way to view and download labor laws in different states of your choosing. If your company has multiple locations in different states and you are concerned about state labor laws that may apply, our simple-to-use tool enables you to build your own side-by-side chart that features selected state laws in as many states as you want. With this fast, efficient tool you can now easily view all the important state statutes side-by-side either online or download the information into an Excel file. The ‘Multi-State Law Comparison Tool’ features:
The Performance Review Builder takes you through a step-by-step process that results in a professionally-developed performance appraisal in minutes. Simply choose an evaluation form based on the employee’s occupation (e.g., clerical, production, sales, management) or create your own by selecting from among 20 performance categories, including:
Based on the ratings you assign; the Performance Review Builder generates specific comments to help you describe performance issues. It also includes the option to create a customizable action plan for improving the employee’s performance.
With our Salary Benchmarking Tool, you can search compensation and pay structure reports either annually or by the hour. Our salary benchmarking survey information can be viewed and compared nationally, by state and within a state by region and/or metro area. We have salary data on over 800 job positions. It’s so simple to use:
The job description is your primary vehicle for announcing the open position to external and internal candidates and is a valuable tool for finding the person best-suited to your organization’s needs. Investing the time and effort in writing a strong job description will enable your organization to accurately articulate the opportunity to potential candidates.
The ‘Total Compensation Statement Builder’ takes you through a step-by-step process that results in the creation of a professional compensation communication document in minutes. Each ‘Total Compensation Statement’ can include:
A “wrap” document is a drafting device used to supplement already-existing documentation. More specifically, a wrap document provides the information required by ERISA by incorporating (or “wrapping” itself around) the insurance policy or similar third-party contract. When a wrap document is utilized, the insurance policy or contract remains part of the plan document. That is, the “wrap” document and the insurance policy or contract together comprise the complete plan document.
Why Does an Employer Need a “Wrap” Document?
The insurance policy or contract issued to an employer rarely meets all the requirements of an ERISA plan document. This is not surprising given that an insurer’s main focus is generally on complying with state laws regulating insurance and not on ERISA compliance. Even when insurers attempt to satisfy ERISA’s requirements, the resulting document does not typically contain all of the provisions designed to protect the plan, the plan administrator, and other plan fiduciaries. Consequently, the use of a “wrap” plan document ensures ERISA compliance (through the “wrap” portion of the document) as well as an accurate insurer-provided benefit description.
A Section 125 Document (also called a POP Document, Cafeteria Plan, or PCP Document) is a written plan that allows employers to take certain insurance premium deductions on behalf of their employees on a pre-tax basis. Section 125 refers to the section in the IRS tax code that includes this regulation.
All employers must have a written Section 125 document in place in order to take premium deductions on a pre-tax basis. Although government entities and church groups are exempt from ERISA, they still need to have a Section 125 Document in place. We are able to provide separate Section 125 Documents, however, the Wrap Document includes a Section 125 Document at no additional cost.