The Treasury Department and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) May 3 announced that they are seeking comments (PDF) from stakeholders on the shared responsibility provisions included in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA).

Under the health care law, employers that have 50 or more full-time employees and fail to offer affordable health coverage to those full-time employees may be required to make a shared responsibility payment. Small firms, which have fewer than 50 full-time employees, are exempt. The provision is scheduled to take effect in 2014.

To facilitate future proposed guidance on this provision, IRS and Treasury are requesting feedback on several issues, including who qualifies as a full-time employee. To help coordinate the approaches of the Departments of Treasury, Labor and Health and Human Services in developing regulations, feedback is also requested on how the departments should interpret and apply provisions scheduled to take effect in 2014 that would limit the ability of plans and issuers to impose a waiting period for health coverage of longer than 90 days.

Comments may be submitted via email to [email protected], with a subject line “Notice 2011-36,” or by mail to Internal Revenue Service, CC:PA:LPD:PR (Notice 2011-36), Room 5203, P.O. Box 7604, Ben Franklin Station, Washington, D.C., 20044. All comments are due by June 17.    

To view the news release, visit the IRS website.