No. You can provide the Employee Notice to your employees the day your QSEHRA begins.
What is the Employee Notice?
As part of the required plan documents to establish your QSEHRA, the IRS requires that you provide a notice to your employees of the plan. QSEHRA was established through the 21st Century Cures Act, which requires in Section 9831(d)(4) that "an eligible employer who provides a QSEHRA to its eligible employees must furnish a written notice of the plan to each eligible employee at least 90 days before the beginning of each year or, for an employee who is not eligible to participate at the beginning of the year, the date on which the employee is first eligible to participate in the QSEHRA."
So what does that mean?
The employee notice must be furnished 90 days before the before a new plan year begins for any employee that is already currently enrolled in the QSEHRA.
In the case of a newly eligible employee, the initial written notice must be furnished on or before the first day they become eligible. This applies to all employees when your QSEHRA first takes effect, since your employees are newly eligible on the first day of your QSEHRA. This also applies to any new employees you hire. For reference, here is the IRS guidance - see Question 37, which addresses this specifically.
When your new QSEHRA first becomes effective, all of your employees are newly eligible. Therefore, providing them with the notice on or before the day they the QSEHRA begins, which is the day they become eligible, satisfies the IRS requirement.
How can Take Command Health help me remain compliant with this requirement?
When you sign up for a QSEHRA, we will create your documents within minutes, including the required Employee Notice! As soon as you approve your documents, we will invite your employees to log in to their accounts to complete onboarding. The onboarding process includes a step for each employee to review the documents. This means that from the first day that your employees become eligible, the required Employee Notice is available in their member portal to them. It will remain available to them through their member portal at all times.
Each year, we will furnish a new Employee Notice by October 1st, 90 days before the new plan year begins on January 1st. We'll reach out to as if you want to make any changes to your plan and will provide the updated notice to your employees in time to remain compliant!
Still not sure where to start? Check out our Admin Resource Center for more resources and support.