Employee benefits

Employees may exclude from gross income the value of leave donated to their employers funding payments to relieve victims of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Health savings account maximum contributions, along with minimum deductibles and maximum out-of-pocket expenses of accompanying high-deductible health plans, will be higher next year.

The existing benchmark of self-only coverage “unduly weakens” the purpose of the Affordable Care Act, the IRS and Treasury say, noting a presidential executive order to strengthen and protect the act.

Proposed regulations provide an exception from the “unified plan rule” for multiple-employer plans consistent with the SECURE Act and give guidance on how to implement the exception.

The regulations governing required minimum distributions from retirement plans would be updated to reflect various recent statutory changes under proposed regulations released on Wednesday.

Proposed regulations would permanently allow an automatic extension for furnishing health care Forms 1095-B and 1095-C and would also specify that Medicaid services to test for and diagnose COVID-19 are not “minimum essential coverage.”

The IRS issued the adjusted ceilings, thresholds, and limitations for various retirement plans and individual retirement accounts for 2022.

Maximum health savings account annual contributions will increase by $50 to $3,650 for self-only and $100 to $7,300 for family coverage for 2022. Inflation adjustments in Rev. Proc. 2021-25 also increase maximum out-of-pocket expenses for high-deductible health plans.