Announce your new benefits

Announce the transition to an employee health budget as soon as possible. Advance notice gives your employees time to understand what's changing, ask questions, and plan before they need to make decisions.

Notify employees of a change in benefits

Following Affordable Care Act (ACA) and Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) guidelines, most employers must give employees 60 days advance notice of healthcare changes. Thatch provides the ICHRA Notice and email templates in your dashboard resources to help you announce your new benefits and prepare employees for the transition.

Employer status	Notice requirement
Newly established employers (less than 120 days old)	No prior notice required before the start of their plan year.
Inviting current employees to a new ICHRA (employer more than 120 days old)	Prior notice required. Most employers use the 60-day notice period required under the ACA, though ICHRA rules specify a 90-day notice requirement.

Share other important benefits updates

If this is your first time offering an ICHRA, there are two additional changes that may require timely action:

• Medicare transition letter: to be sent to Medicare-eligible employees and dependents at least 60 days before Thatch benefits begin.
• ICHRA Notice for COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee.: to be sent to COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee. participants and those within their election period at least one month before Thatch benefits begin, if you are a COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee.-mandatory employer.

Send the Medicare transition letter

What to do: At least 60 days before Thatch benefits begin, send the Medicare transition letter to employees and dependents who are 65 or older or turning 65 within three months.

• To use Medicare with their Thatch benefits, employees must enroll in Medicare Parts A and B through the Social Security Administration before using their health budget.
• Applications can take four to six weeks or longer — applying late risks a coverage gap.

Medicare enrollment isn't required, but individual plan coverage options are limited for members 65 and older: they can use a Medicare exemption to elect individual coverage, or decline employer benefits entirely. Because some carriers don't offer individual plans to people 65 and older, Thatch can't guarantee individual plan enrollment for these employees.

About the Medicare transition letter

Send this letter to eligible employees and dependents about upcoming changes to your medical benefits. It encourages them to start applying for Medicare Parts A and B with the Social Security Administration. Send it as soon as possible so employees are ready for a smooth transition.

Who the Medicare letter is for

Medicare-eligible employees and dependents:

• Anyone 65 or older, or turning 65 within three months
• Employees or family members who qualify for Medicare before 65 due to a disability

Why the Medicare letter is time-sensitive

The Social Security Administration requires members to apply for Parts A and B on their own before meeting with a licensed broker about additional coverage like Medicare Advantage or Medigap. Once enrolled in Parts A and B, all Medicare parts are reimbursable through Thatch.

Employees who haven't applied before their Thatch invite risk a delayed coverage start date or having to reschedule with our concierge team.

More information about Medicare and employee health budgets is in the member docs.

Inform COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee. participants

What to do: At least one month before Thatch benefits begin, download the ICHRA Notice for COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee. from your Resources page and send it to COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee. participants and former employees who are still within their election period.

What to know about the COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee. notice

• Participants and recently terminated employees need to be informed that their group health benefits are terminating.
• Sending this notice is only necessary until Thatch benefits begin — then Thatch will send COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee. notices to enrolled individuals if you select the COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee. option when offboarding employees in Thatch.

How COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee. works with your employee health budget

Unlike group health insurance, COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee. is not required for individuals to retain their individual health insurance or Medicare coverage after their employment ends.

To participate in COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee., the former employee is required to have eligible individual insurance or Medicare. The participant pays a COBRACOBRA A federal law that allows employees to temporarily continue employer-sponsored health insurance after leaving a job, reducing work hours, or experiencing other qualifying events. Employees typically pay the full premium cost plus an administrative fee. premiumpremium The monthly amount paid to maintain health insurance coverage, regardless of whether any services are used that month. that costs 102% of the health budget they’d receive, of which 2% is an administration fee. They can then reimburse themselves for their health plan’s premiumpremium The monthly amount paid to maintain health insurance coverage, regardless of whether any services are used that month. costs from their employee health budget.

Learn more about how COBRA works when offering an employee health budget.

How Thatch supports your employees

Your employees' health insurance belongs to them, so questions or changes to their coverage have to come directly from them.

Policy conversations often involve personal health information, so we only share those details with the employee unless they tell us it's okay to include their HR team. And because coverage decisions affect an employee and their family, we need to confirm any change or question actually came from them.

Share this overview with your employees so they know where to get the support they need.

What your employee needs	Where they get it
Enrolling on Thatch for the first time	When it’s time to enroll on Thatch, you’ll get an email from hello@thatch.com. Sign up using the link in your invitation email. Note that this address is used for outgoing messages only and is not monitored for replies — if you have questions, reach out to support@thatch.com.
Questions about health insurance	Ask Thatch is here to help. Just look for the purple help icon in the lower right corner of your screen.
Help choosing a plan	To schedule time with our licensed concierge team, either tell Ask Thatch you want to schedule time with an advisor, or click Help & support in the lower left corner of your screen and select I need help choosing between plans.
Managing your benefits on Thatch	Log in to your Thatch member dashboard to review your enrollment status, check on payments, make changes to your plan, and much more.
For everything else	Tell Ask Thatch what you need, and a member of our support team will reach out to you by email. Our team can also be reached at support@thatch.com.

tip

See an example employee communications calendar with key resources and announcement dates.