Moore Stephens North America and Smart1095 are pleased to announce a collaborative relationship for Obamacare IRS Employer Reporting

Moore Stephens North America (MSNA), the 6th largest Accounting Firm association in the United States and ACA Managed Services, a leading full service Affordable Care Act IRS employer reporting company, are pleased to announce a collaborative relationship to help member firms and their clients comply with the Affordable Care Act. Smart1095 is an Obamacare IRS employer reporting solution that produces employee-facing 1095-C forms and the 1094-C IRS transmittal on behalf of Applicable Large Employers (ALEs).

Employers should be aware the deadline for issuing 1095-C forms is March 2nd and the deadline for 1094-C electronic filing is March 31st. Various IRS penalties apply to employers that do not issue the mandated 1095-C forms and submit the required transmittal to the IRS. “Given the fast-approaching deadline and the materiality of non-filing penalties, the timing is right to make this service available to our clients,” says Tony Szczepaniak, CEO of MSNA. “MSNA is the perfect distribution partner for us,” according to Howard Gerver, President of ACA Managed Services. “We have been searching for a national public accounting partner particularly with many clients in the under-served 50 – 500 employee size,” adds Gerver.

1095-C employee-facing reporting and 1094-C IRS filing has been particularly challenging as many of the payroll and HR systems utilized by mid-market employers do not have the requisite Obamacare reporting functionality. With data limitations, reporting becomes a highly manualized and time consuming process. “The beauty of Smart1095 is its simplicity - the system only requires 18 data elements (for insured plans) most of which are already in the payroll system. Employers only need to add a few extra data elements pertaining to benefits, such as Offer Date, Benefits Start Date and Benefits End Date,” according to Gerver.

While the Obamacare employer reporting market is dominated by large payroll outsourcing vendors and many new entrants seeking to capitalize on business opportunities, ACA Managed Services (parent of Smart1095) has been providing ACA compliance administration services since 2014 and has been providing other HR compliance technology services through HR Best Practices since 2001. “Many of our clients engaged ACA Managed Services to perform 1095-C/1094-C reporting last year and then renewed with them again this year," according to Steven Goldstein, an audit partner at Grassi and Company, a Moore Stephens North America member firm. “Employers should not feel abandoned by the market or threatened by material IRS penalties given the utility and ease of Smart1095,” adds Goldstein.

Even though the first deadline is less than 2 weeks away tens of thousands of employers are still lacking an Obamacare employer reporting solution according to a survey of 1,200 CPAs conducted by ACA Managed Services. “This is very simple – employers must comply with this reporting requirement as the Obamacare employer requirements are still required,” adds Goldstein. “Employer non-compliance will translate to billions of dollars for the IRS. Employer reporting inertia is likely due to the questionable status of the Affordable Care Act, thedismantling of the ACA per President Trump’s Executive Order, the easing of individual reporting (1040 line 61) and the lack of follow up by the IRS,” adds Gerver.

The final 2016 Obamacare employer reporting deadline to the IRS is March 31st. “We are hopeful employers take these reporting requirements seriously and do in fact comply. With tools like Smart1095, employers now have an affordable and practical path to make this happen on time and with ease,” adds Tony Szczepaniak.