With the catastrophic and widespread devastation of Hurricane Helene and Milton, the IRS has issued group health plan relief for individuals who lived or worked in certain counties/tribal areas in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia during these disasters.

What Relief is Available?

The relief provides an extension of certain timeframes for ERISA-covered employee benefit plans, participants, beneficiaries, qualified beneficiaries, and claimants affected by Hurricane Helene, Tropical Storm Helene, and Hurricane Milton.

Depending on which benefits you offer with EBC, the following deadlines may have a timeline extension associated with the group health plan relief.

• 60-Day COBRA Election Period
• COBRA Payment Deadlines
• HIPAA Special Enrollment Deadlines
• Claim and Claim Appeal Submission Deadlines
• Qualifying Event Notification Deadlines

Relief Overview

Eligibility

This group health plan relief generally applies to individuals who lived or worked in counties or tribal areas designated for Individual Assistance by FEMA relative to Hurricane Helene, Tropical Storm Helene, and/or Hurricane Milton, if they lived or worked in such areas at the time of the hurricane or tropical storm. Relief also applies to individual covered by group health plans sponsored by certain employers located in an impacted county or tribal area at the time of the hurricane or tropical storm. A complete list of counties identified for relief related to Hurricane Helene can be found here and a list related to Hurricane Milton can be found here.

Deadline Extension Relief

The relief requires ERISA-covered group health plans to ignore the “Relief Period” when calculating the above deadlines. The duration of the Relief Period depends on the participant’s disaster location:

Our Commitment

EBC is committed to our clients and participants as they begin to recover their lives and their businesses following Helene and Milton. Participants that wish to request deadline relief should contact our Participant Services Team. To help reduce the burden to the companies and people that are affected by this disaster, we will publish additional blog posts if further IRS and Department of Labor (DOL) guidance becomes available.

Employers who have questions about this relief should contact their Client Account Representative. Their information can be found in the footer of the employer’s online account.