A cafeteria plan — It has nothing to do with eating, but everything to do with attracting top employees to your firm.

by Scott Turner

Especially if you happen to be one of those unflinchingly ambitious micro-business entrepreneurs, I’ve been reading about everyday in pubs like Crain’s Chicago Business, you’ll eventually find that designing and offering up an attractive employee-benefits package will be an essential component of your future growth. An attractive health plan will do just that - attract - helping you recruit and retain crucial employees (meaning those fought over creative class/knowledge worker types Richard Florida is always yammering about). You’ll also find that a generous group plan will help link your employees’ interests to your concern’s.

That said, there are a seemingly unlimited number of group benefits options to consider. One that you’ll want to move to the top of your list is a Cafeteria Plan. The cafeteria brand of benefit plan can add a lot freedom to a employee compensation package, allowing your workforce to choose benefits options ala carte, if you will - selecting only the benefit options they’re most interested in.

Perhaps I should start closer to the beginning cafeteria plans, also known as the flexible spending account, the choice spending account or the section 125 plan, have become increasingly popular over the last few years because they’re designed to offer employees a truly convenient way to pay medical expenses with pre-tax dollars; relieving them of the burden of federal, and state taxes.

To take advantage of a flexible spending account, eligible employees set aside a pre-designated amount each year, in order to pay for medical expenses aren’t already eligible for coverage. The two most common types of flexible-spending accounts are dependent care reimbursement (also known as DCRAs) and health care reimbursement accounts. Employees pay for non-reimbursed expenses from these accounts. Unfortunately, flexible-spending accounts are “use-it-or-lose-it” accounts; meaning that any funds leftover at the end of the year can’t be “rolled over,” so to speak.

Exceptions To Those Limits Apply to Key Employees

Typically, funds set aside in a cafeteria plan’s flexible-spending account are exempt from income, payroll, and unemployment taxes. This exemption generally also applies to payroll and unemployment taxes paid on behalf of employees. (Take a look at IRS Pub. 15-B for exceptions, including treatment of highly compensated employees and certain shareholders of Subchapter S Corporation’s.)

Premiums paid to a group life benefits policy are typically exempt from income and unemployment taxes. In addition, premiums paid for up to $50,000.00 of benefits coverage per employee tend to be exempt from payroll taxes. For additional details, see IRS Publication 15-B.

You see, cafeteria plans offer you some versatility in putting together a benefits plan for your workforce. There are other categories of fringe benefits that you can offer your employees in a cafeteria plan that may be excluded from taxable income under IRS benefit-exclusion rules. Using a flexible-spending account — namely, establishing a DCRA and HCRA — may help to jump-start a cafeteria plan for your workforce. If you maintain a cafeteria plan, the IRS requires you to complete IRS Form 5500.

To help you keep track of employment-related costs, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) publishes a quarterly statistic called the employment cost index. The cost index measures changes in employee-compensation costs, which include salaries, wages, and benefits. In addition to publishing the quarterly cost index, BLS publishes an annual survey of compensation costs.

A well-thought-out benefits package understands an employee’s needs and also keeps in mind the employer’s objectives. In prevailing market conditions, a competitive benefits package can serve as a nice recruitment tool and also act as an effective tool for employee retention.

Basic benefit plans for employees include healthcare, retirement, holiday pay and paid vacation time. There are in-depth plans that cover things like flexible spending and day care.

Many employers are now offering “cafeteria plans” in which employees can choose from a menu and level of benefits. In most cases, these plans are funded by both the employees and the employers, and benefit both of them.

Healthcare insurance covers reimbursement for a number of things: medical fees, eye examinations, dental work, prescription drugs, hospital services, surgery, false teeth, x-rays, weight loss programs, and so on. Such a package follows either of these two plans, a Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA) or a Medical Reimbursement Plan (MRP). In HRAs, account balances can be rolled over from year to year if the employer agrees to do so, thus helping employees to better manage their own healthcare. Although equally flexible, MRPs are different from HRAs because they allow employers to reimburse cost from a specific time period, whereas HRAs roll over and provide benefits after an employee terminates employment.

Among retirement plans, a 401(k) plan allows employees to give a portion of their earnings to a retirement plan on a pre-tax basis. The employer can choose to match contributions to boost employee participation. Giving employees a sense of ownership, an Employee Stock Option Program is a retirement plan that invests primarily in employer stock.

A Defined Benefit Plan is the only qualified retirement plan that guarantees employees a retirement benefit. Under these plans, employees are allowed to cash out upon retirement or draw a monthly benefit based on compensation and years of service. Profit Sharing Plans allow employees to share in company profits. A 403(b) plan is similar to a 401(k) plan except for different rules on contribution limits and requirement.

Employee benefits plans are part of the basic employee welfare programs implemented by employers. They aim to fulfill the basic needs of employees. These employee benefit plans include various health insurance programs including life, dental and allied health related benefits, retirement benefits, daycare, tuition reimbursement, sick leave, disability benefits, paid vacations, social security and income protection.

Various companies provide benefits to the organizations and employers. Among these benefits, insurance, sick leaves, paid vacations, retirement benefits and income protection are considered to be basic and mandatory benefits. Insurance is the common benefit provided. It helps in covering the employees in the case of accidents and help in tax deduction at the same time.

An employee is considered to be eligible to enjoy the benefits of these welfare plans after the completion of a probation period. These benefits form the part of any company?s policy and are communicated to the employee in writing.

The insurance companies strive to make their plans attractive and beneficial for the employees. They conduct regular research on benefits, and come up with new ideas to make the plans more attractive. These plans are decided considering the designation, company profile and the number of employees.

Employee benefit plans also serve as a good marketing strategy for employers. A huge percentage of the payroll of most of the companies is spent on deciding and investing in the benefit plans. The human resource personnel run a check on the employee benefit programs offered by the various insurance companies. They refer to the websites providing information regarding these plans and select programs that would best suit the company?s interest.

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