Should I Drop ObamaCare When I Get Employer Health Insurance?
I currently receive assistance from Obamacare, but recently got a job that provides healthcare to its full time employees. Do I wait until the next open enrollment date to change my insurance, or do I change as soon as possible?
Answer
If you get a job that offers health insurance you'll want to drop your ObamaCare cost assistance and most likely want to switch to the employer plan. This is because people with access to affordable employer based health insurance don't qualify for cost assistance like tax credits. If you take tax credits after the point employer based coverage would have started you can end up owing back tax credits at the end of the year for the months you improperly took them. Make sure to let the Marketplace know when the new coverage starts so you can cancel your old plan on or very close to the date the new coverage starts. As long as you have less than a full month without coverage in between insurances you won't owe the fee for that month. Lastly if you gain and then lose employer based coverage (for any reason other than fraud or non-payment) you will qualify for a special enrollment period to switch back to Marketplace coverage.
Please note that if you get a job that doesn't offer you health insurance or want to stay on a private plan that doesn't offer health insurance (even if it was purchased on the Marketplace you can.) Just keep in mind your employer only offers one chance each year for you to enroll in their coverage, so if you decline coverage you can miss your opportunity.
Also keep in mind, that only those offered coverage through the employer are barred from getting cost assistance. If coverage isn't offer to a spouse they can retain Marketplace coverage.
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Please clairify: “Also keep in mind, that only those offered coverage through the employer are barred from getting cost assistance. If coverage isn’t offer to a spouse they can retain Marketplace coverage.” Will the spouse qualify on his income alone or will he have to report my income and will he be entilied to any subsidy?
The spouse will report family income. In general, unless income is deducted via MAGI or AGI, the tax family is shared by whoever files taxes together and then the ACA uses tax family household income compared to the federal poverty level for subsidization programs.
My husband is self employed and we currently have marketplace insurance that requires a specific YEARLY income to be less than a certain amount. If he gets a job with insurance and we cancel the marketplace insurance…our yearly income will probably exceed the required YEARLY amount …. Will we have to pay any amount back even though salary was in correct range until he started new job
If I work as a temp with an agency and estimate my next year’s salary to be over the amount to qualify for a subsidy, but by the end of the year it turns out I could have qualified, would I be able to deduct from taxes the amount I might have gotten from a subsidy? Is the subsidy only dependent on your income, or does the amount I have in savings count? If I pay a premium now for a marketplace plan starting in January and then I get a full-time job with insurance before January, could I get a refund?
I did not know that I should of taking insurance from my job place.So now at tax time will they take my taxes?
I feel like I’m being punished for finding a job with benefits. I had Obamacare with subsidies for 8 months. Then I got a new job with benefits (finally!) I dropped Obamacare immediately, in fact I called over a month in advance to transition from one insurance to the other, and now I’m being forced to pay back $750 on my income tax.
This doesn’t seem right. I needed those subsidies based on my income at the time, but because I got a new job with employee health insurance I’m being asked to retroactively pay for something that I didn’t even have for the last 4 months of the year?
That’s like an internet service provider giving you a new customer discount and then turning around and charging you the full amount 4 months after you’ve canceled their service and gone with another provider. Surprise!
I guess I didn’t read the fine print and I don’t remember anyone at Healthcare.gov telling me about a $750 penalty. I feel blindsided. I just got this new job. It’s not like a have $750 lying around to give to the government. If I did I wouldn’t have needed the subsidies in the first place!!!