Is Your Business Eligible For Group Health Insurance?

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Is Your Business Eligible For Group Health
Insurance?
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• When it comes to purchasing group health
  insurance for your small business, the rules are
  very different to individual or family coverage,
  and you may not even know if your business
  qualifies for it. Outlined below are a few basic
  questions, that when answered, should help to
  point you in the right direction if youre buying
  group health insurance for your employees
• What is group health insurance?
• Group medical coverage is usually issued to
  businesses or organizations with employees and
  refers to one policy that is given to an entire
  group of individuals, and sometimes covers
  dependents of those individuals, too.

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• Individual coverage has a different set of rules
  than group coverage, and this is down to the way
  in which the insurers risks are calculated.
  Insurers determine a premium price based upon the
  entire group of employees within a small
  business, and they do so, using general
  information about them, such as their age or
  gender.
• Are small businesses required by law to provide
  group health insurance?
• There have been substantial changes in the world
  of health insurance in recent years, and while
  there is no law that mandates small business
  owners must provide health insurance for their
  workers, if you do choose to provide coverage for
  your workforce, then you will need to be aware of
  the regulations.

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• Under the Affordable Care Act, some larger
  businesses are at risk of incurring penalties if
  they dont offer coverage to their workforce,
  while those companies employing 50 full time
  workers or less, will not face penalties if they
  dont offer health coverage.
• Is your small business eligible for group health
  insurance?
• A small employer is defined as one whose business
  has from 2 to 50 full time workers, and under
  federal law, these employers are guaranteed group
  coverage if they opt to provide it for their
  workforce, irrespective of the health status of
  those employees.

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• Business owners are usually included as
  employees, so even a sole proprietorship that has
  one employee, falls into the small business
  category, in much the same way as partnerships,
  since the very definition of partnership is that
  at least one other person is involved.
• Which employees are eligible for coverage?
• If at least one full time employee has been
  offered health insurance by their employer, then
  the general rule is that the employer must then
  offer it to all full-time staff. For part-time
  employees, the employer may opt to provide them
  with coverage too, and if it is offered to some
  of them, then again, it must be offered to them
  all.

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• The employees health status is not taken into
  consideration when coverage is offered to them,
  so any employee eligible for health insurance
  must not be denied coverage due to pre-existing
  medical conditions.
• Also, under group health insurance plans,
  dependents of eligible employees are usually
  included in the coverage, and these can range
  from spouses, domestic partners and children.
  However, those dependents may not apply for
  coverage unless the employee themselves has
  enrolled, and under the Affordable Care Act,
  group insurance plans are now required to include
  coverage for dependents up to the age of 26.

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• For more detailed advice and guidance about group
  health insurance for the employees of your small
  business seek help from a qualified and
  professional payroll service.
• Apollo Payroll is one of the premier small
  business payroll services companies in Miami and
  Coral Gables. Apollo Payroll is dedicated to
  delivering expert advice, responsive service, and
  highly accurate payroll processing and reporting
  to ensure the success and growth of the business
  that we serve. Our services include comprehensive
  payroll services in Homestead and other cities in
  Miami-Dade County, employee background check and
  group health insurance in Miami Coral Gables