ACA calendars provide the calendar period definitions which ActivityHD uses to produce ACA records for your full-time and variable hours employees. ACA records determine the boundaries around an employee's health care coverage offers including employment milestones like hire dates, change of employment status dates, and termination dates, as well as measurement results and offer tracking. While most companies will only need to define one ACA calendar, multiple calendars can be set up to accommodate companies with varying measurement cycles.
Before you set up an ACA calendar for the first time, you should consider the business rules which govern your health care coverage. Consider the following questions:
- When does the insurance plan year begin and end? The plan year dates correspond to the standard stability period dates.
- When does your annual open enrollment period begin? The open enrollment period typically corresponds to the standard administration period.
- How long (in months) will you measure new variable hours employees' work hours before determining their eligibility for health care coverage?
- When does the measurement of a new variable hours employee's work hours begin? On the date of hire? After an initial waiting period?
The following rules apply to setting up calendar periods:
- A measurement period
A span of 3 to 12 months during which an employee's hours of service are counted to determine whether the employee should be treated as full-time or part-time with respect to health care coverage. can span from 3 to 12 months. - A stability period A span of 6 to 12 months during which an employee is treated as full-time or not full-time for the purposes of determining eligibility for health plan coverage. A standard stability period parallels the insurance plan year. An initial stability period follows an initial measurement period plus its ensuing administration period. can span from 6 to 12 months and must be at least as long as the measurement period.
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Measurement periods may start on any day of the month, but a measurement period must consist of whole months.
Example
Suppose your measurement period is 12 months long and begins on 10/16/2015. The end date of the measurement period would be 10/15/2016.
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Stability periods must start on the first day of the month and consist of whole months.
Example
Suppose your stability period is 12 months long and begins on 1/1/2016. The end date of the stability period would be 12/31/2016.
- The length of the variable time hiring period plus the length of the administration period A period of 90 days or fewer allotted for an employer to process insurance plan enrollments. must be less than or equal to 90 days.
Note
The procedure that follows does not progress from left to right as is typical, but instead starts with the stability period and works backward and forward from there.
- In the Navigation pane, highlight the Payroll/Human Resources > Setup > ACA > Calendars folder.
- Click
. The New ACA Calendar window opens.
- A standard calendar is used to process ACA records for on-going employees. To set up standard calendar periods:
- In the first blank row of the Detail table, in the Type column, select "Standard" from the drop-down list.
In the Stability Period Begin and End columns, enter the dates of the first and last days of your plan term.
Notes
The stability period must begin on the first day of a month and end on the last day of a month.
The stability period must consist of between 6 and 12 months and must be at least as long as the measurement period you will define in the Measurement Period columns.
- In the Measurement Period Basis column, select the basis for determining which employees are part-time and which are full-time. Your options are:
- Monthly. Employees with more than 130 hours per month are deemed full-time; with less, part-time.
- Weekly. Employees with more than 30 hours per week are deemed full-time; with less, part-time.
- In the Measurement Period Begin and End columns, enter the dates of the first and last days of the standard measurement period.
Notes
The measurement period must consist of between 3 and 12 months.
The measurement period must consist of whole months but need not begin on the first of the month. For instance, a 12-month measurement period could span 10/16/2015 to 10/15/2016.
Tip
When you tab out of the Measurement Period End column, the Administration Period Begin and End dates are filled in for you. These dates should correspond to your open enrollment period. The administration period must be 90 days or fewer.
- In the Variable Time Hiring Period End column, enter the last date a variable hours employee can be hired and still be included in processing for the standard calendar.
- In the Full Time Hiring Period End column, enter the last date a full-time employee can be hired and still be included in processing for the standard calendar.
- Repeat steps a-f for each standard period you need to set up.
- In the first blank row of the Detail table, in the Type column, select "Standard" from the drop-down list.
- An initial calendar period is used to process ACA records for new hires. To set up initial calendar periods:
- In the first blank row of the Detail table, in the Type column, select "Initial" from the drop-down list.
In the Stability Period Begin and End columns, enter the dates of the first and last days of the initial stability period for variable hours employees hired during the associated variable time hiring period.
Notes
The stability period must begin on the first day of a month and end on the last day of a month.
The stability period must consist of between 6 and 12 months.
- In the Measurement Period Basis column, select the basis for determining which employees are part-time and which are full-time. Your options are:
- Monthly. Employees with more than 130 hours per month are deemed full-time; with less, part-time.
- Weekly. Employees with more than 30 hours per week are deemed full-time; with less, part-time.
In the Measurement Period Begin and End columns, enter the dates of the first and last days of the initial measurement period.
Notes
The measurement period must consist of between 3 and 12 months.
The measurement period must consist of whole months but need not begin on the first of the month. For instance, a 12-month measurement period could span 10/16/2015 to 10/15/2016.
When you tab out of the Measurement Period End column, the Administration Period Begin and End dates are filled in for you. The administration period plus the variable time hiring period must total 90 days or fewer.
- In the Variable Time Hiring Period Begin and End columns, enter the dates of the first and last days a variable hours employee can be hired and included in processing for the initial calendar period.
- In the Full Time Hiring Period Begin and End columns, enter the dates of the first and last days a full-time employee can be hired and included in processing for the initial calendar period.
Repeat steps a-f for each initial period you need to set up.
Tip
After you enter the first initial calendar period, you can simply select "Initial" in successive lines and ActivityHD will fill in the default values for the periods for you.
- In the first blank row of the Detail table, in the Type column, select "Initial" from the drop-down list.
- When you finish, save the calendar.
Purpose
The ACA Calendars Listing provides a list of the ACA calendars defined in Payroll.
Content
For each ACA calendar included on the report, the listing shows:
- calendar code
- description.
If you include detail on the report, the listing shows the following for each calendar period:
- type of calendar period (standard or initial)
- date range for the variable time hiring period
- measurement period basis (monthly or weekly)
- date range for the measurement period
- date range for the administration period
- date range for the stability period
- date range for the full-time hiring period.
In addition, you can include one or more of the following:
- timestamps
- memos
- custom fields.
Print the report
- In the Navigation pane, highlight the Payroll/Human Resources > Setup > ACA > Calendars folder.
- Start the report set-up wizard.
- To report on all or a filtered subset of ACA calendars:
- Right-click the Calendars folder and select Select and Report > ACA Calendars Listing from the shortcut menu.
- On the Selection tab, define any filters to apply to the data.
- To report on specifically selected ACA calendars:
- In the HD view, select the ACA calendars to include on the report. You can use Ctrl and/or Shift selection to select multiple records.
- Click
and select ACA Calendars Listing from the drop-down menu.
- To report on a particular ACA calendar from the ACA Calendar window:
- In the HD view, locate and double-click the ACA calendar to report on. The ACA Calendar window opens with the ACA calendar loaded.
- Click and select ACA Calendars Listing from the drop-down menu.
- To report on all or a filtered subset of ACA calendars:
- Select the Options tab.
- Mark the checkbox(es) for the additional information to include:
- Detail
- Timestamps
- Memos
- Custom Fields (only visible if custom fields are set up)
- Select the Output tab.
- In the Design field, look up and select the report design to use.
- In the toolbar, click the icon for the type of output you want:
- Provides access to two preview options.- Preview - Click the icon or click the drop-down arrow and select Preview from the drop-down menu to view the report in the Crystal Reports viewer.
- Preview to PDF - Click the drop-down arrow next to the icon and select Preview to PDF to view the report in the PDF reader.
- Opens the Print dialog so that you can select and configure a printer and then print a paper copy of the report.
- Opens the Report Email dialog so that you can address and compose an email that the report will be attached to. For best results, ensure your email client is running before you attempt to send a report via email.
- Opens the Export Report dialog so that you can save the report to a file. File types include Crystal Reports (.rpt), PDF (.pdf), Microsoft Excel (.xls), Microsoft Word (.doc), rich text (.rtf), and XML (.xml).
Data extensions
The following data extensions are available for the report:
- ACA calendars
- ACA calendar detail
ACA Calendar Record ID
Calendar tab
- Initial. An initial calendar period is used when processing new hires.
- Standard. A standard calendar period is used when processing on-going employees.
This cell is disabled for standard calendar periods.
If this row represents an initial calendar period, enter the earliest hiring date for variable hours employees to which the measurement period, administration period, and stability period defined on this row apply.
- Monthly. Employees with more than 130 hours per month are deemed full-time; with less, part-time.
- Weekly. Employees with more than 30 hours per week are deemed full-time; with less, part-time.
This column is blank for standard calendar periods.
For initial calendar periods, this column displays the date of the first day of the administration period. This date is the day after the last day of the measurement period.
This column is blank for standard calendar periods.
For initial calendar periods, this column displays the date of the last day of the administration period. This date is the day before the first day of the stability period.
This column is disabled for standard calendar periods.
If this row represents an initial calendar period, this is the earliest hiring date for full-time employees to which the stability period defined on this row applies.
ACA calendars security
Common accesses available on ACA calendars
Report Email dialog
- Windows user default account. Sends email using the user's Windows default email account. For most users, this is the account configured in Outlook or another email client application.
- Server personal. Sends email using the email configuration for the system or company server and the email address on the current user's authorized user record. The authorized user record must have a confirmed email address.
- Server generic. Sends email using the email configuration and "from" address for the system or company server. This option requires "Send generic" access to the Server Email resource.
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