contractor success The Affordable Care Act And Cleaning Businesses By: Ariel Gilreath ObamaCare is a reality; knowing how it will affect your business is imperative. T The recent controversy surrounding the Affordable Care Act set forth by President Barack Obama, commonly referred to as “ObamaCare,” is a reality that both employ-ees and business owners will need to face. Cleaning industries are particularly af-fected by this act because there must be enough employees to service and clean accounts — this makes many businesses responsible for providing their employees with full healthcare. The Affordable Care Act says that com-panies with more than 50 full-time em-ployees are required to provide them with health insurance. While there is a tax credit that business-es may qualify for allowing them to balance out some of the extra cost of healthcare, it only applies to businesses with fewer than 25 full-time equivalent employees, and not for businesses over the 50 limit that are actually required to provide health insurance. In this case, two half-time employees would equal a full-time one. So in order to be eligible for the credit, businesses would have to have fewer than 25 equivalent employees. Small businesses with fewer than 25 full-time employees will then only be eligible for the tax credit if they cover at least 50 percent of the healthcare cost for each in-dividual worker. There are companies that benefit from this act, such as small, family-owned busi-nesses that already provide healthcare, and smaller companies that were hoping for a cheaper way to provide healthcare. This is a very limited viewpoint being that the company would have to be under the 25 employee limit. There are companies that refuse to talk about their opinions on the Affordable Care Act due to the uncertainty. “We don’t know how it’s going to affect us yet,” said Ron Chapman, human resources for the janitorial company Dycos. The Affordable Care Act has sent many companies into an unresponsive state on Who Benefits? Middle class employees who could not previously afford health insurance can ben-efit from the Affordable Care Act, but other small businesses may be unable to meet the cost of insurance while still maintaining a sustainable yearly profit. Image courtesy of Josh Rinehults/iStockphoto/Thinkstock The Supreme Court must rule on the minimum amount of coverage required by the Affordable Care Act. 38 CM/Cleaning & Maintenance Management ® • June 2013
CMM – Archives June 2013: 38
