Government relief measures on may provide compensation and health benefit coverage for employees

As business closures increase due to the COVID‐19 pandemic, employers are faced with questions about compensation and health benefit coverage for their employees. Government relief measures may provide compensation for businesses and individuals in certain situations. In other cases, existing rules on employee rights will apply. Paid leave may be required for some employees by federal or state law. Also, some state insurance regulators are requiring insurance carriers to provide policyholders with additional flexibility regarding premiums and coverage, and some carriers are making similar changes independent of state requirements. 

This section of the toolkit provides a summary of the issues that employers may encounter when terminating or suspending employment due to COVID‐19.