While it may seem like Covered California is big brother looking over your shoulder or studying your tax return in a darken closet with the flash light, they aren’t. They are able to let their computer software check discreet pieces of data that relate to your eligibility for health insurance and any premium tax credit. But no one Covered California is making any decisions on eligibility or tax credits for the past, present, or future, based on reviewing your tax return. They just don’t have access to it.
IRS
Posts related to the IRS and the Premium Tax Credit reconciliation, MAGI, Form 8962, for Covered California ACA.
Unaffordable Health Insurance Rates Trigger Relief From Individual Mandate
The real story is that rates, especially for older people, have risen so much in the individual and family market that health insurance under the IRS definition of being unaffordable can happen at a very young age. Below are examples of the least expensive Bronze plan rates in Region 1 and Region 3. Within a thirty minute drive between Auburn (Region 3) and Grass Valley (Region 1) in Northern California the rates can be sharply higher.
IT Issues Prevent IRS From Easily Verifying Correct ACA Subsidies For Tax Filers
31,493 tax returns – programming errors caused the IRS to incorrectly compute the allowable PTC amount. As a result, 16,375 taxpayers potentially received approximately $5.2 million more in the PTC than they were entitled to receive, and 15,118 returns potentially received approximately $6.7 million less in the PTC than they were entitled to receive. IRS management informed us that programing was updated on or before July 31, 2016. We will evaluate the IRS’s corrective action in our annual assessment of the 2017 Filing Season.
Will Trump Executive Order Waive ACA Premium Tax Credit Repayments?
Under an Executive order signed by President Trump on January 20, 2017, he gave federal bureaucracies the discretion and authority to waive any provision of the Affordable Care Act that might impose a fiscal burden on individuals and families. Two of the most prominent fiscal burdens are the repayment of excess Advance Premium Tax Credits and the Shared Responsibility Payment also known as the individual mandate penalty for not having health insurance.
IRS Underpayment Payment Penalty Triggered with Obamacare Subsidy Repayment
Some individuals and families who purchased their health insurance through a government exchange like Healthcare.gov or Covered California may be subject to the Penalty for Underpayment of Estimated Tax. The underpayment penalty is triggered when the federal income tax due is less than 90% of the previous year’s tax liability. If a tax household received thousands of dollars of the monthly Advance Premium Tax Credit (APTC) subsidy to lower their health insurance premiums, but earned too much taxable income to actually qualify for the Premium Tax Credit, the tax payer has to repay the entire subsidy. This repayment amount could easily trigger the underpayment penalty.
Relationship between Covered California, IRS, & Health Insurance Tax Credits
While Covered California does a great job of marketing their services as an individual and family health insurance marketplace, the ultimate connection of reporting health insurance coverage to the IRS is not a central part of Covered California consumer education.
Medi-Cal Estate Recovery and IRS 1095-B confusion
The implementation of Obamacare requires it to be administered by a variety of federal, state, and local government bureaucracies. Many consumers have been caught in a swirl of seemingly conflicting and utterly confusing rules, advice, and government forms. This cauldron of Obamacare confusion is particularly acute among individuals over 55 years old who are subject to California’s Medi-Cal Estate Recovery program. The anxiety instilled in this population is compounded by conflicting IRS 1095 forms that seem to open the door to a large tax bill for the repayment of the premium subsidies they received during the year.
Deflating income under 400% to keep health insurance subsidy
Built into the Affordable Care Act is the loss of the health insurance subsidy when the household income exceeds 400% of the federal poverty line. For older adults whose income might be greater than 400% of the federal poverty line they face losing the Advance Premium Tax Credits that makes their health insurance premiums affordable. In some instances the health insurance premiums can shoot up to over 20% of their income.
ABCs of the 1095 health insurance coverage and tax credits
All individuals and households who had health insurance during 2015 will receive a Form 1095-x. How you received your health insurance will determine who sends the 1095-x to you. You may receive different 1095s based on whether you had Medicaid, private health insurance purchased through a Marketplace exchange like Covered California, or through employer based health insurance plan. Each of the 1095s will be appended with a different letter ( -A, -B, -C) depending on the issuer of the form.
Medi-Cal Individual Household Size Flowchart
The Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) has developed a Medi-Cal household size flow chart. The DHCS Guide for Calculating MAGI Medi-Cal Individual Household Size was originally developed to help county eligibility workers ascertain the actual household size under the new Affordable Care Act (ACA) rules. The newly expanded Medi-Cal eligibility under the ACA revolves around on IRS definitions for tax dependents and non-filer rules. Because families can be so diverse and the rules regarding what constitutes a tax family so complicated, the flow chart for determining household size was created.