AGC Joins Letter in Support of Repealing the Auto Enrollment Provisions of the ACA

This week, AGC joined 171 employers and employer associations in a letter supporting the Auto Enroll Repeal Act (S. 2546). This bill was introduced by Senator Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) and would repeal the automatic enrollment provision under the Affordable Care Act (section 1511).   The law states that employers with 200 or more full-time employees are required to automatically enroll their full-time employees in health care coverage by their 91st day of employment, unless the employee had opted out prior to the deadline. Employers that are subjected to this requirement are already bound by the health care law’s Shared Responsibility for Employers provision, which requires an offer of coverage to these same employees. Groups are concerned that automatic enrollment may create additional confusion for employees in an already complex benefit area, and could result in unnecessary hardship if they find themselves automatically enrolled in a plan they do not wish to participate in. Overall, the automatic enrollment requirement is redundant, expensive and unnecessarily burdensome for employers without increasing employees’ access to coverage. For more information, please contact Jim Young at (202) 547-0133 or youngj@agc.org.