FICA 3% Healthcare Contribution Refunds – Guidance for Distribution will be Forthcoming
On December 20, 2017, the Michigan Supreme Court ordered refunds, upholding a Court of Appeals ruling that a 2010 Michigan law violated contract clauses of the state and federal constitutions by involuntarily reducing pay for teachers and other school employees by 3% to fund retiree healthcare benefits.
The Office of Retirement Services (ORS) will release the detail of the amount your district will receive from the State. The detailed lists will contain the amount of payment, the amount of interest, the most recent address of the individual the refund is being issued to, and the social security number. The payment is expected to be made in a separate payment on the same day that districts receive their State Aid payment.
For more information, see the ORS FAQ.
The 1022 Committee is working with the Michigan School Business Officials, the Michigan Department of Education and the ORS to issue streamlined guidance for all districts. Yeo & Yeo is a member of the 1022 Committee and has been actively involved throughout the process. As of now, we recommend that once your district receives the payment, you should wait to issue payments to employees and/or former employees until the guidance is issued. We realize that you may be getting pressure from employees to make the payments, but it will be best if all school districts wait for the guidance and are consistent with the payouts and reporting. We anticipate that we will send an update on the guidance next week, with the actual written guidance coming out in 15 to 30 days.
Please contact your Yeo & Yeo representative with any specific questions.