The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) regulations state that breaks in service greater than 26 weeks require employees to begin a new measurement period. To comply with this, if an employee has a break in service of more than 26 weeks (excluding FMLA and Military Leave), the employee record should be terminated and then the individual should be rehired at a later time if needed.
If an employee is rehired after a break in service longer than 26 weeks, they will be placed into a new measurement period. If the break in service is not expected to last longer than 26 weeks, then the individual should be placed on an appropriate leave (short work break). When an employee has a break in service of less than 26 weeks, they will be placed back into the same measurement/coverage period that they were in at the time of their break began. It is understood that this could create additional I‐9 verification and criminal background checks.
Reviewed 2015-08-19
