Automating Health Care Reform Compliance Saves Time and Money
"When you think about having to capture hours manually for 5,000 employees with a very small staff, it doesn't make any sense at all. So automating the process with all the form coding and the various employee hours has been a nice, seamless process." - Irene Stewart, Executive Director, Benefits Compensation and HR Operations, Elwyn Inc.
Founded in 1852, Elwyn Inc. is an internationally recognized health and human services nonprofit. Elwyn is the premier provider of choice for children and adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities, along with physical, medical, emotional and behavioral health challenges. It is known for its innovation and for providing compassionate care to those it serves.
When the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was first enacted, Elwyn had two benefits specialists who captured all the necessary employee information for its nearly 5,000 employees manually, using spreadsheets. Irene Stewart, executive director, benefits compensation and HR operations at Elwyn, was originally brought in as a consultant to automate the process. We recently spoke to Irene about how implementing the ADP SmartCompliance Health Compliance module has helped Elwyn to confidently manage their data and easily address IRS ACA penalties and to save time and money.
In Irene's own words:
Trying to manage health care compliance in-house
I initially was brought onboard at Elwyn to help automate benefits administration. Up until that time, there were two people in the benefits department who were manually capturing all hours worked to ensure we complied with the ACA. When you think about having to capture hours manually for 5,000 employees with a very small staff, it doesn't make any sense at all. So automating the process with all the required form coding and calculating the various employee hours has been a nice seamless process.
Relying on ADP for IRS assistance when needed
In the recent past, we've experienced some situations where we've received the employer-shared responsibility payment penalties from the IRS — two penalty requests in two of our companies. In both circumstances, I sent the penalty notices directly to ADP. We encounter some situations where employees go from eligible to non-eligible and back to eligible again based on ACA criteria. With ADP's help in responding to the IRS, we had both penalties eliminated, which amounted to $10,000. We're working on another situation now with the IRS, and we expect to engage ADP for support in helping to eliminate potential penalties.
An incomparable level of service
Our account representative, Stephanie, was on top of things for us right from the beginning and that gives her a unique perspective on Elwyn's needs. She understands our business. We have several Federal Employee Identification Numbers (FEINs), which complicate our situation. Stephanie knows that we also have federal contract employees who are not part of the system. There are special feeds that have to be brought in for them, and she's well-versed on this. Stephanie also can use her relationships with other ADP employees to provide assistance when it's needed.
Whenever we work with Stephanie, we get amazing service. She goes out of her way to make time for us, whenever we need it. She made the Form 1094/1095 process go very smoothly for us this year — a process that can be really stressful. Stephanie is always willing to go above and beyond, so I'm very pleased with her and the service we receive from ADP. I think these types of relationships are critical, and they're the reason why clients want to stay with ADP.
Seeing the results and saving money
With ADP Health Compliance, we save all that time that the department used to spend manually calculating ACA hours of service. We no longer do that. We now have a level of precision and accuracy that we could never have achieved with our manual process. I have tremendous faith that everything's being done correctly and accurately — and that level of precision and accuracy is so much greater than when we did this manually.
The only thing we're doing now is some research, if we receive a report that requires us to investigate something further. Researching is different than running all the counts, which ADP does flawlessly for us. Of course, time is money, so from an ROI perspective, it's a huge time saver. And with that time savings, we're able to focus on higher-value work.
Recommending ADP SmartCompliance Health Compliance to peers
I'm always willing to be a positive reference. I think it's a very good solution, and it was easy to implement. It's a necessary solution. There's no reason to spend a department's time manually performing all the ACA employer mandate and reporting requirements. Are things always perfect? Of course not. However, when there's an issue, ADP quickly addresses and solves the problem. I'm happy we're using it.
About Elwyn Inc.
- Headquarters: Media, PA
- Industry: Nonprofit
- Number of employees: 5,000
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