A victory for Maine nonprofits: Blanket exemption from sales and use tax

Benchmarking doesn’t need to be time and resource consuming. Read on for four simple steps you can take to improve efficiency and maximize resources.

Stop us if you’ve heard this one before (from your Board of Trustees or Finance Committee): “I wish there was a way we could benchmark ourselves against our competitors.”

Have you ever wrestled with how to benchmark? Or struggled to identify what the Board wants to measure? Organizations can fall short on implementing effective methods to benchmark accurately. The good news? With a planned approach, you can overcome traditional obstacles and create tools to increase efficiency, improve operations and reporting, and maintain and monitor a comfortable risk level. All of this can help create a competitive advantage — and it  isn’t as hard as you might think.

Even with a structured process, remember that benchmarking data has pitfalls, including:

• Peer data can be difficult to find. Some industries are better than others at tracking this information. Some collect too much data that isn’t relevant, making it hard to find the data that is.
   
• The data can be dated. By the time you close your books for the year and data is available, you’re at least six months into the next fiscal year. Knowing this, you can still build year-over-year trending models that you can measure consistently.
   
• The underlying data may be tainted. As much as we’d like to rely on financial data from other organization and industry surveys, there’s no guarantee that all participants have applied accounting principles consistently, or calculated inputs (e.g., full-time equivalents) in the same way, making comparisons inaccurate.

Despite these pitfalls, benchmarking is a useful tool for your organization. Benchmarking lets you take stock of your current financial condition and risk profile, identify areas for improvement and find a realistic and measurable plan to strengthen your organization.

Here are four steps to take to start a successful benchmarking program and overcome these pitfalls:

1. Benchmark against yourself. Use year-over-year and month-to-month data to identify trends, inconsistencies and unexplained changes. Once you have the information, you can see where you want to direct improvement efforts.
2. Look to industry/peer data. We’d love to tell you that all financial statements and survey inputs are created equally, but we can’t. By understanding the source of your information, and the potential strengths and weaknesses in the data (e.g., too few peers, different size organizations and markets, etc.), you will better know how to use it. Understanding the data source allows you to weigh metrics that are more susceptible to inconsistencies.

3. Identify what is important to your organization and focus on it. Remove data points that have little relevance for your organization. Trying to address too many measures is one of the primary reasons benchmarking fails. Identify key metrics you will target, and watch them over time. Remember, keeping it simple allows you to put resources where you need them most.

4. Use the data as a tool to guide decisions. Identify aspects of the organization that lie beyond your risk tolerance and then define specific steps for improvement.

Once you take these steps, you can add other measurement strategies, including stress testing, monthly reporting, and use in budgeting and forecasting. By taking the time to create and use an effective methodology, this competitive advantage can be yours. Want to learn more? Check out our resources for not-for-profit organizations here.

Do you know what would happen to your company if your CEO suddenly had to resign immediately for personal reasons? Or got seriously ill? Or worse, died? These scenarios, while rare, do happen, and many companies are not prepared. In fact, 45% of US companies do not have a contingency plan for CEO succession, according to a 2020 Harvard Business Review study.  

Do you have a plan for CEO succession? As a business owner, you may have an exit strategy in place for your company, but do you have a plan to bridge the leadership gap for you and each member of your leadership team? Does the plan include the kind of crises listed above? What would you do if your next-in-line left suddenly? 

Whether yours is a family-owned business, a company of equity partners, or a private company with a governing body, here are things to consider when you’re faced with a situation where your CEO has abruptly departed or has decided to step down.  

1. Get a plan in place. First, assess the situation and figure out your priorities. If there is already a plan for these types of circumstances, evaluate how much of it is applicable to this particular circumstance. For example, if the plan is for the stepping down or announced retirement of your CEO, but some other catastrophic event occurs, you may need to adjust key components and focus on immediate messaging rather than future positioning. If there is no plan, assign a small team to create one immediately. 

Make sure management, team leaders, and employees are aware and informed of your progress; this will help keep you organized and streamline communications. Management needs to take the lead and select a point person to document the process. Management also needs to take the lead in demeanor. Model your actions so employees can see the situation is being handled with care. Once a strategy is identified based on your priorities, draft a plan that includes what happens now, in the immediate future, and beyond. Include timetables so people know when decisions will be made.  

2. Communicate clearly, and often. In times of uncertainty, your employees will need as much specific information as you can give them. Knowing when they will hear from you, even if it is “we have nothing new to report” builds trust and keeps them vested and involved. By letting them know what your plan is, when they’ll receive another update, what to tell clients, and even what specifics you can give them (e.g., who will take over which CEO responsibility and for how long), you make them feel that they are important stakeholders, and not just bystanders. Stakeholders are more likely to be strong supporters during and after any transition that needs to take place. 

3. Pull in professional help. Depending on your resources, we recommend bringing in a professional to help you handle the situation at hand. At the very least, call in an objective opinion. You’ll need someone who can help you make decisions when emotions are running high. Bringing someone on board that can help you decipher what you have to work with and what your legal and other obligations may be, help rally your team, deal with the media, and manage emotions can be invaluable during a challenging time. Even if it’s temporary. 

4. Develop a timeline. Figure out how much time you have for the transition. For example, if your CEO is ill and will be stepping down in six months, you have time to update any existing exit strategy or succession plan you have in place. Things to include in the timeline: 

• Who is taking over what responsibilities? 
• How and what will be communicated to your company and stakeholders? 
• How and what will be communicated to the market? 
• How will you bring in the CEO's replacement, while helping the current CEO transition out of the organization? 

If you are in a crisis situation (e.g., your CEO has been suddenly forced out or asked to leave without a public explanation), you won’t have the luxury of time.  

Find out what other arrangements have been made in the past and update them as needed. Work with your PR firm to help with your change management and do the right things for all involved to salvage the company’s reputation. When handled correctly, crises don’t have to have a lasting negative impact on your business.   

5. Manage change effectively. When you’re under the gun to quickly make significant changes at the top, you need to understand how the changes may affect various parts of your company. While instinct may tell you to focus externally, don’t neglect your employees. Be as transparent as you possibly can be, present an action plan, ask for support, and get them involved in keeping the environment positive. Whether you bring in professionals or not, make sure you allow for questions, feedback, and even discord if challenging information is being revealed.  

6. Handle the media. Crisis rule #1 is making it clear who can, and who cannot, speak to the media. Assign a point person for all external inquiries and instruct employees to refer all reporter requests for comment to that point person. You absolutely do not want employees leaking sensitive information to the media. 
 
With your employees on board with the change management action plan, you can now focus on external communications and how you will present what is happening to the media. This is not completely under your control. Technology and social media changed the game in terms of speed and access to information to the public and transparency when it comes to corporate leadership. Present a message to the media quickly that coincides with your values as a company. If you are dealing with a scandal where public trust is involved and your CEO is stepping down, handling this effectively will take tact and most likely a team of professionals to help. 

Exit strategies are planning tools. Uncontrollable events occur and we don’t always get to follow our plan as we would have liked. Your organization can still be prepared and know what to do in an emergency situation or sudden crisis.  Executives move out of their roles every day, but how companies respond to these changes is reflective of the strategy in place to handle unexpected situations. Be as prepared as possible. Own your challenges. Stay accountable. 

BerryDunn can help whether you need extra assistance in your office during peak times or interim leadership support during periods of transition. We offer the expertise of a fully staffed accounting department for short-term assignments or long-term engagements―so you can focus on your business. Meet our interim assistance experts.

Read this if your CFO has recently departed, or if you're looking for a replacement.

With the post-Covid labor shortage, “the Great Resignation,” an aging workforce, and ongoing staffing concerns, almost every industry is facing challenges in hiring talented staff. To address these challenges, many organizations are hiring temporary or interim help—even for C-suite positions such as Chief Financial Officers (CFOs).

You may be thinking, “The CFO is a key business partner in advising and collaborating with the CEO and developing a long-term strategy for the organization; why would I hire a contractor to fill this most-important role?” Hiring an interim CFO may be a good option to consider in certain circumstances. Here are three situations where temporary help might be the best solution for your organization.

Your organization has grown

If your company has grown since you created your finance department, or your controller isn’t ready or suited for a promotion, bringing on an interim CFO can be a natural next step in your company’s evolution, without having to make a long-term commitment. It can allow you to take the time and fully understand what you need from the role — and what kind of person is the best fit for your company’s future.

BerryDunn's Kathy Parker, leader of the Boston-based Outsourced Accounting group, has worked with many companies to help them through periods of transition. "As companies grow, many need team members at various skill levels, which requires more money to pay for multiple full-time roles," she shared. "Obtaining interim CFO services allows a company to access different skill levels while paying a fraction of the cost. As the company grows, they can always scale its resources; the beauty of this model is the flexibility."

If your company is looking for greater financial skill or advice to expand into a new market, or turn around an underperforming division, you may want to bring on an outsourced CFO with a specific set of objectives and timeline in mind. You can bring someone on board to develop growth strategies, make course corrections, bring in new financing, and update operational processes, without necessarily needing to keep those skills in the organization once they finish their assignment. Your company benefits from this very specific skill set without the expense of having a talented but expensive resource on your permanent payroll.

Your CFO has resigned

The best-laid succession plans often go astray. If that’s the case when your CFO departs, your organization may need to outsource the CFO function to fill the gap. When your company loses the leader of company-wide financial functions, you may need to find someone who can come in with those skills and get right to work. While they may need guidance and support on specifics to your company, they should be able to adapt quickly and keep financial operations running smoothly. Articulating short-term goals and setting deadlines for naming a new CFO can help lay the foundation for a successful engagement.

You don’t have the budget for a full-time CFO

If your company is the right size to have a part-time CFO, outsourcing CFO functions can be less expensive than bringing on a full-time in-house CFO. Depending on your operational and financial rhythms, you may need the CFO role full-time in parts of the year, and not in others. Initially, an interim CFO can bring a new perspective from a professional who is coming in with fresh eyes and experience outside of your company.

After the immediate need or initial crisis passes, you can review your options. Once the temporary CFO’s agreement expires, you can bring someone new in depending on your needs, or keep the contract CFO in place by extending their assignment.

Considerations for hiring an interim CFO

Making the decision between hiring someone full-time or bringing in temporary contract help can be difficult. Although it oversimplifies the decision a bit, a good rule of thumb is: the more strategic the role will be, the more important it is that you have a long-term person in the job. CFOs can have a wide range of duties, including, but not limited to:

• Financial risk management, including planning and record-keeping
• Management of compliance and regulatory requirements
• Creating and monitoring reliable control systems
• Debt and equity financing
• Financial reporting to the Board of Directors

If the focus is primarily overseeing the financial functions of the organization and/or developing a skilled finance department, you can rely — at least initially — on a CFO for hire.

Regardless of what you choose to do, your decision will have an impact on the financial health of your organization — from avoiding finance department dissatisfaction or turnover to capitalizing on new market opportunities. Getting outside advice or a more objective view may be an important part of making the right choice for your company.

BerryDunn can help whether you need extra assistance in your office during peak times or interim leadership support during periods of transition. We offer the expertise of a fully staffed accounting department for short-term assignments or long-term engagements―so you can focus on your business. Meet our interim assistance experts.

Editor's note: read this if you are a CFO, controller, accountant, or business manager.

We auditors can be annoying, especially when we send multiple follow-up emails after being in the field for consecutive days. Over the years, we have worked with our clients to create best practices you can use to prepare for our arrival on site for year-end work. Time and time again these have proven to reduce follow-up requests and can help you and your organization get back to your day-to-day operations quickly. 

1. Reconcile early and often to save time.
   Performing reconciliations to the general ledger for an entire year's worth of activity is a very time consuming process. Reconciling accounts on a monthly or quarterly basis will help identify potential variances or issues that need to be investigated; these potential variances and issues could be an underlying problem within the general ledger or control system that, if not addressed early, will require more time and resources at year-end. Accounts with significant activity (cash, accounts receivable, investments, fixed assets, accounts payable and accrued expenses and debt), should be reconciled on a monthly basis. Accounts with less activity (prepaids, other assets, accrued expenses, other liabilities and equity) can be reconciled on a different schedule.
2. Scan the trial balance to avoid surprises.
   As auditors, one of the first procedures we perform is to scan the trial balance for year-over-year anomalies. This allows us to identify any significant irregularities that require immediate follow up. Does the year-over-year change make sense? Should this account be a debit balance or a credit balance? Are there any accounts with exactly the same balance as the prior year and should they have the same balance? By performing this task and answering these questions prior to year-end fieldwork, you will be able to reduce our follow up by providing explanations ahead of time or by making correcting entries in advance, if necessary. 
3. Provide support to be proactive.
   On an annual basis, your organization may go through changes that will require you to provide us documented contractual support.  Such events may include new or a refinancing of debt, large fixed asset additions, new construction, renovations, or changes in ownership structure.  Gathering and providing the documentation for these events prior to fieldwork will help reduce auditor inquiries and will allow us to gain an understanding of the details of the transaction in advance of performing substantive audit procedures. 
4. Utilize the schedule request to stay organized.
   Each member of your team should have a clear understanding of their role in preparing for year-end. Creating columns on the schedule request for responsibility, completion date and reviewer assigned will help maintain organization and help ensure all items are addressed and available prior to arrival of the audit team. 
5. Be available to maximize efficiency. 
   It is important for key members of the team to be available during the scheduled time of the engagement.  Minimizing commitments outside of the audit engagement during on site fieldwork and having all year-end schedules prepared prior to our arrival will allow us to work more efficiently and effectively and help reduce follow up after fieldwork has been completed. 

Careful consideration and performance of these tasks will help your organization better prepare for the year-end audit engagement, reduce lingering auditor inquiries, and ultimately reduce the time your internal resources spend on the annual audit process. See you soon. 

Read this if your company is considering outsourced information technology services.

For management, it’s the perennial question: Keep things in-house or outsource?

For management, it’s the perennial question: Keep things in-house or outsource? Most companies or organizations have outsourcing opportunities, from revenue cycle to payment processing to IT security. When deciding whether to outsource, you weigh the trade-offs and benefits by considering variables such as cost, internal expertise, cross coverage, and organizational risk.

In IT services, outsourcing may win out as technology becomes more complex. Maintaining expertise and depth for all the IT components in an environment can be resource-intensive.

Outsourced solutions allow IT teams to shift some of their focus from maintaining infrastructure to getting more value out of existing systems, increasing data analytics, and better linking technology to business objectives. The same can be applied to revenue cycle outsourcing, shifting the focus from getting clean bills out and cash coming in, to looking at the financial health of the organization, analyzing service lines, patient experience, or advancing projects.  

Once you’ve decided, there’s another question you need to ask
Lost sometimes in the discussion of whether to use outsourced services is how. Even after you’ve done your due diligence and chosen a great vendor, you need to stay involved. It can be easy to think, “Vendor XYZ is monitoring our servers or our days in AR, so we should be all set. I can stop worrying at night about our system reliability or our cash flow.” Not true.

You may be outsourcing a component of your technology environment or collections, but you are not outsourcing the accountability for it—from an internal administrative standpoint or (in many cases) from a legal standpoint.

Beware of a false state of confidence
No matter how clear the expectations and rules of engagement with your vendor at the onset of a partnership, circumstances can change—regulatory updates, technology advancements, and old-fashioned vendor neglect. In hiring the vendor, you are accountable for oversight of the partnership. Be actively engaged in the ongoing execution of the services. Also, periodically revisit the contract, make sure the vendor is following all terms, and confirm (with an outside audit, when appropriate) that you are getting the services you need.

Take, for example, server monitoring, which applies to every organization or company, large or small, with data on a server. When a managed service vendor wants to contract with you to provide monitoring services, the vendor’s salesperson will likely assure you that you need not worry about the stability of your server infrastructure, that the monitoring will catch issues before they occur, and that any issues that do arise will be resolved before the end user is impacted. Ideally, this is true, but you need to confirm.

Here’s how to stay involved with your vendor
Ask lots of questions. There’s never a question too small. Here are samples of how precisely you should drill down:

• What metrics will be monitored, specifically?
• Why do the metrics being monitored matter to our own business objectives?
• What thresholds must be met to notify us or produce an alert?
• What does exceeding a threshold mean to our business?
• Who on our team will be notified if an alert is warranted?
• What corrective action will be taken?

Ask uncomfortable questions
Being willing to ask challenging questions of your vendors, even when you are not an expert, is critical. You may feel uncomfortable but asking vendors to explain something to you in terms you understand is very reasonable. They’re the experts; you’re not expected to already understand every detail or you wouldn’t have needed to hire them. It’s their job to explain it to you. Without asking these questions, you may end up with a fairly generic solution that does produce a service or monitor something, but not necessarily all the things you need.

Ask obvious questions
You don’t want anything to slip by simply because you or the vendor took it for granted. It is common to assume that more is being done by a vendor than actually is. By asking even obvious questions, you can avoid this trap. All too often we conduct an IT assessment and are told that a vendor is providing a service, only to discover that the tasks are not happening as expected.

You are accountable for your whole team—in-house and outsourced members
An outsourced solution is an extension of your team. Taking an active and engaged role in an outsourcing partnership remains consistent with your management responsibilities. At the end of the day, management is responsible for achieving business objectives and mission. Regularly check in to make sure that the vendor stays focused on that same mission.

The Coronavirus Preparedness and Response Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2020, which provides $8.3 billion in emergency funding for federal agencies to respond to the COVID-19 outbreak, has earmarked $100 million for FQHCs to prevent, prepare for, and respond to the COVID-19 national emergency. Pre-award costs will be supported by this funding and may date back to January 20, 2020. We recommend tracking your expenditures related to the coronavirus to the best of your ability. This may be helpful or necessary in providing your organization much needed financial relief.  

As a reminder, FQHCs cannot bill Medicare for telehealth services under the PPS rate. Telehealth can be billed to Medicare under Part B with the FQHC as an originating site and reimbursement is approximately $26. If you do not have home visits on Form 5, be sure to add home visits to 5C as soon as possible.

Amidst rapid hourly changes in contending with the coronavirus and its far-reaching impacts, we are sharing some HRSA and CMS guidance that may be helpful to you: 

• HRSA PAL 2020-01 Telehealth and Health Center Scope of Project 
• HRSA PAL 2017-07 Temporary Privileging of Clinical Providers by FTCA Deemed Health Centers in Response to Certain Declared Emergency Situations
• HRSA PAL 2014-05 Updated Process for Requesting a Change in Scope to Add Temporary Sites in Response to Emergency Events
• CMS COVID-19 Emergency Declaration Health Care Providers Fact Sheet
• CMS Medicare Telemedicine Fact Sheet

Here is a link to HRSA FAQs related to COVID-19. 

Although we are working remotely, we are available to support you. If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to reach out to any of us.

The President signed The Families First Coronavirus Response Act (hereinafter the “Act”) into law on March 18th and the provisions are effective April 2nd. You can read the congressional summary here. There are two provisions of the Act that deal with paid leave provisions for employees. Here are some highlights for employers.

The provisions of the Act are only required for employers with fewer than 500 employees. Employers with over 499 employees are not required to provide the sick/family leave contained in the Act, but could voluntarily elect to follow the new rules. The expectation is that employers with over 499 employees are providing some level of sick/family leave benefits already. In any case, employers with over 499 employees are not eligible for the tax credits. 

Employers with fewer than 500 employees are required to provide employees with up to 80 hours of paid sick leave over a two-week period if the employee:

• Self-isolates because of a diagnosis with COVID-19, or to comply with a recommendation or order to quarantine;
• Obtains a medical diagnosis or care if the employee is experiencing COVID-19 symptoms;
• Needs to care for a family member who is self-isolating due to a COVID-19 diagnosis or quarantining due to COVID-19 symptoms; or
• Is caring for a child whose school has closed, or childcare provider is unavailable, due to COVID-19.

These rules apply to all employees regardless of the length of time they have worked for the employer. The 80-hours would be pro-rated for those employees who do not normally work a 40-hour week. 

Employees who take leave because they themselves are sick (i.e., the first two bullets above) can receive up to $511 per day, with an aggregate limit of $5,110. If, on the other hand, an employee takes leave to care for a child or other family member (i.e., the last two bullets above), the employee will be paid two-thirds (2/3) of their regular weekly wages up to a maximum of $200 per day, with an aggregate limit of $2,000.

Days when an individual receives pay from their employer (regular wages, sick pay, or other paid time off) or unemployment compensation do not count as leave days for the purposes of this benefit.

Family and Medical Leave Act

Employees who have been employed for at least 30-days also have the right to take up to 12 weeks of job-protected leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA). The Act requires that 10 of these 12 weeks (i.e., after the sick leave discussed above is taken) be paid at a rate of no less than two-thirds of the employee’s usual rate of pay. Any leave taken under this portion of the ACT will be limited to $200 per day with an aggregate limit of $10,000.

Exemptions

The Secretary of Labor has the authority to issue regulations exempting: (1) certain healthcare providers and emergency responders from taking leave under the Act; and (2) small businesses with fewer than 50 employees from the requirements of the Act if it would jeopardize the viability of the business.

Expiration

The provisions of the Act are set to expire on December 31, 2020, and unused time will not carry over from one year to the next.

Tax credits 

The Act provides for refundable tax credits to help an employer cover the costs associated with providing paid emergency sick leave or paid FMLA. The tax credits work as follows:

• A refundable tax credit for employers equal to 100 percent of qualified family leave wages paid under the Act.
• A refundable tax credit for employers equal to 100 percent of qualified paid sick leave wages paid under the Act. 
• The tax credits are taken on Form 941 – Employer’s Quarterly Federal Income Tax Return filed for the calendar quarter when the leave is taken and reduce the employer’s portion of the Social Security taxes due. If the credit exceeds the employer’s total liability for Social Security taxes for all employees for any calendar quarter, the excess credit is refundable to the employer.

For more information

We are here to help. Please contact our benefit plan consultants if you have any questions or would like to discuss your specific situation. 

Editor's note: read this if you are a leader in an accountable care organization and interested in value-based contracting.

Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) and value-based payments: an introduction

With the goal of slowing the rising cost of healthcare while maintaining the delivery of high-quality care, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and private payers utilize a number of different provider payment models. The primary approach to address increasing healthcare costs has been to move away from fee-for-service payment models—which incentivize increasing the volume of care provided—to value-based payment models, which hold providers accountable for both the cost and quality of care they provide. The models have the potential to lead to reduced revenue for some providers, an outcome that can be avoided by successfully attracting larger patient populations. 

Value-based payment model options 

CMS has been a driver in this transition by moving physician reimbursement from being solely based on the Resource-Based Relative Value Scale (RBRVS) fee-for-service methodology to one that adds performance-based elements either through the Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) or Advanced Alternative Payment Models (Advanced APMs):

• Providers that are MIPS eligible will have up to 9% of their RBRVS-based payments adjusted for four categories: quality, cost, clinical practice improvement activities, and promoting interoperability.
• Providers in an Advanced APM may earn an incentive payment based on their participation in an innovative payment model―with more opportunity for incentive rewards being given to those who take downside financial risk. 

On the hospital side, CMS developed the Hospital Value-Based Purchasing (VBP) Program in order to move away from reimbursement based strictly on Diagnosis Related Groups (DRGs). The Hospital VBP Program rewards hospitals with incentive payments based on the quality of care they provide to Medicare beneficiaries. 

ACO value-based payment models are APMs that typically incorporate quality and the total cost of care for all services for a specific population, rather than just a specific clinical condition or care episode. Under the ACO model, CMS contracts with providers to assume increasing financial risk and reward opportunities while also being held accountable for their quality performance managing defined sub-populations they serve. These types of models are also employed by private payers.

How can ACOs succeed with payment models constantly changing?

ACOs should proceed with caution as they enter models with accountability for financial risk such as the newly finalized CMS Pathways to Success program and certain private payer commercial models. In order to be successful in any model, it is critical that ACOs have an adequate foundation in place and a provider network built to provide coordinated care. Some of the key elements for your success include:

• Population data: Data for the ACO members that is a comprehensive record of their recent health utilization and spending history is critical.
• Eligibility reporting: Require that eligibility files are provided on a monthly basis, and understand the way in which members are attributed or assigned. 
• Claims data: Ensure accurate and complete claims data will be provided by payers monthly for the ACO members.
• Financial/quality reporting: Ensure creation of infrastructure to generate reporting from the population data on a timely basis. Without timely reporting, the actual performance against benchmarks will not be known until it is too late to take any action.
• Actuarial support: Validating spending targets and performance settlement should draw on the expertise of a qualified actuary.
• Clinical documentation: Ambulatory clinical documentation categorizes patients based on the complexity of their diagnoses, which can be a predictor of future health care costs and used to identify at risk members for care management, disease management, and other programs. 
• Population health management tools: Establish capabilities around population health management, specifically data aggregation and analysis that results in actionable recommendations
• Audit capability: Verify the accuracy of payer financial and quality reports including the risk adjustment methodology.

Success in value-based payment models will require ACOs to understand changes to their population and quickly respond to address quality, utilization, and cost trends. 

Did you know that there was more than a 40% increase (from $4.3 billion to $6.0 billion) in civil penalties assessed by the IRS regarding employment tax, for the 2016 fiscal year?

A recent report from the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration calls for more cases to involve criminal investigation by the Department of Justice. This is significant because the requirements needed to prove a civil violation under Sec. 6672 are nearly identical to the requirements of a criminal violation under Sec. 7202, and a criminal violation can result, among other penalties, in imprisonment for up to five years.

The issue of employment taxes encompasses all businesses, even tax-exempt entities. For fiscal year 2016, employment tax issues were involved in over 26% of audits of exempt organizations. One main reason why employment tax is a major issue? Its role in funding our government: employment taxes make up $2.3 trillion dollars (70%) of the $3.3 trillion dollars collected by the IRS for fiscal year 2016.

And noncompliance is a major issue, with roughly $45.6 billion of unemployment taxes, interest and penalties still owed to the IRS as of December 2015. This trend of increasing noncompliance, combined with the vital role employment taxes has in funding our government helps explain why the IRS has increased focus and enforcement in this area.

Should your independent contractor truly be an employee? Did you properly report fringe benefits as taxable income to the individuals who received them? Knowing the answers to these questions can help you stay in compliance with the law. If you have any questions about your employment tax situation, or how we can help you ensure compliance on this and other tax issues, please contact your BerryDunn tax advisor.