Warren Jahn, from Silverbrook Systems, provides Human Resources software solutions for Dynamics SL.  He offers this additional insight on the recent government changes:

You may want to ensure your Payroll/HR clients are also aware of other employment law changes occurring at about the same time.

1. A revised Form I-9 must be used starting April 3, 2009. The change to the form itself is pretty simple (a new checkbox for non-citizen nationals) but there is a fine for using the old form. More importantly, the documents acceptable for List A, B, and C have changed. GOOD NEWS: There is no need to obtain new I-9s from existing employees.

Users of Silver Brook Human Resources may obtain an updated I-9 (XH.150.00) screen from their web site.  Everyone else can download the new I-9 form here.


2. There are RETROACTIVE changes to COBRA. These changes are much more far-reaching than the I-9 and require action. In short, most
employees who were involuntarily terminated on or after September 1,2008 up to and including December 31, 2009 are eligible for COBRA at 35% of the cost instead of the normal 102% for up to 9 months. The employer needs pay the remaining premium and obtains reimbursement by a credit on payroll taxes.

One very important part of these revisions is a requirement to send by April 18, 2009 new COBRA notices to all employees who were involuntarily terminated from employment after September 1, 2008 whether the employee
elected COBRA coverage or not.

There is a very useful summary of these new COBRA provisions and requirements  on the "Pennsylvania Employment Law Blog" maintained by Russell, Krafft &
Gruber, LLP.

Will SL 941 reporting be modified to allow the capturing of the employer COBRA credit?
Bug 18742 was submitted to support the revised 941 form for 2009. The line for COBRA will not be calculated. Instead, it will appear as an underline so that the user can specify the amount. Keep in mind that the 941 in SL is a worksheet.