Employee Retention Credit Became

Many businesses and organizations have faced unprecedented hardships and challenges as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Many employers have faced reduced revenues, increased expenses, and disrupted operations due to lockdowns, social distancing, and health and safety measures.

To help employers retain their employees and provide them with health benefits during this difficult time, the U.S. government has introduced the Employee Retention Credit (ERC), a refundable tax credit that can offset some of the payroll costs for eligible employers.

The ERC, which was originally enacted in 2020 by the CARES Act, was extended and modified later by subsequent legislation in both 2021 & 2023. The ERC will be explained in this article, along with how it works and the different eligibility criteria and time periods for which it can be claimed.

For a brief reading of what the Employee Retention Credit or ERC is, take a look at this video from the YouTube channel “ERC Specialists”. You can also continue below to read an in-depth explanation of ERC.

What is the Employee Retention Credit? Employee Retention Credit Became

Employee Retention Credit (ERC), a refundable tax credits, is available for tax-exempt businesses or organizations with employees that were affected in any way by the COVID-19 Pandemic. The ERC is a refundable tax credit that was created by 2020’s CARES Act and has been extended and changed by subsequent legislations of 2021 and 2023. The ERC’s goal is to encourage employers during a crisis to continue to employ their workers, and to offer them health coverage.

Main Features and Benefits

Credit is a fixed percentage of qualifying wages and health care costs paid by employers to employees.
The percentage and limit will vary depending on when the credit is claimed. In 2020, 50% of the employees will be eligible for the credit, with a maximum limit of $5,000 per employee. For 2021, it is 70%. The limit is $7,000 per quarter per employee. For 2023, the percentage will be 70% for the two first quarters and 40% for the two last quarters. The limit per employee per quarter is $10,000. Employee Retention Credit Became
The credit amount is fully refundable, meaning if the credit exceeds your employer’s tax liability on payroll, you will receive the excess as a reimbursement.
The credit can be claimed by employers who experienced a significant decline in gross receipts or a full or partial suspension of operations due to a qualifying government order related to COVID-19. Employers who are considered to be recovery startup businesses may also claim this credit, but only for 2023.
Credits may be obtained by filing a revised employment tax form (Form 941X) or reducing employment deposit amounts in anticipation. Employers may also request an advanced payment of the credit using Form 7200.

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Eligibility Criteria

To qualify as an employer for the Employee retention Credit (ERC), you must meet at least one of the two criteria below:

A government order suspended the employer’s organization or business in full or part due to COVID-19 for a calendar quarter of 2020 or 2021
Employer’s gross receipts in a calendar quarter of 2020 or 2021 was less than 50% or 80% of the gross receipts in the same quarter in 2019.

A special rule is in place for businesses that have started operating after February 15, 2020, and whose average gross receipts per year are no more than one million dollars. These businesses can qualify for the ERC regardless of business suspension or revenue decline.

Business Suspension

A government order can either suspend or fully suspend a company or organization if the following conditions are met:

The order limits travel, commerce or group meetings as a result of COVID-19
The order impacts the operations of a business or organization
The order applies to all calendar quarters in 2020 and 2021

These are some examples:

Stay-at-home orders prohibiting the operation of non-essential businesses
Certain businesses have curfews that limit their hours of operations
Capacity limits that reduce the number of customers or clients that can be served by a business
Travel restrictions or bans that impact the ability of an organization to transport goods and services

An employer should consider the following factors to determine if an order from a government has suspended a business in its entirety or only partially.

How the nature and scope and the order affect the operation of the business
The order’s duration, frequency, and alignment with the calendar quarters
The impact of an order on revenue and expenses

Revenue Decline

It is considered a significant decrease in gross revenue if a business has:

The gross receipts from any quarter in 2020 is less than 50% its gross receipts from the same calendar quarter in 2019.
The gross revenues for any calendar-quarter in 2021 will be less than 80 percent of the gross revenue in 2019 for that same quarter.

Gross receipts are defined as the total amount received or accrued by a business or organization from all sources during its annual accounting period without any deductions. Gross receipts include:

Sales of Goods and Services
Dividends, rents, and royalties, as well as interest, are all examples of annuities.
Donations, contributions, grants and gifts Employee Retention Credit Became
Membership dues
Gross profits from trades and businesses

To calculate and compare gross receipts for different quarters, an employer must use:

The same method of accounting (cash or accrual) that it used to file its federal income tax return for 2019
Use the same calendar quarters as it did for its federal employment tax return (Form 941 ) for 2019 and 2021/2022
The same sources of income that it reported on its federal income tax return for 2019

Recovery Startup Business

A startup that is in recovery can be defined as

Start any new business or occupation after February 15, 2019,
Have average annual gross income of no more than $1 million over the three-year period ending the tax year before the calendar quarter in which the credit is determined

A recovery startup business can qualify for the ERC regardless of whether it meets the criteria of business suspension or revenue decline. Recovery Startup Businesses are still subject to some restrictions and special rules.

The maximum credit amount per quarter is $50,000
The credit is only applicable to wages paid for the third and fourth quarters of 2021
The maximum credit available for startup businesses is $250 million.

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Credit Amounts Calculation

For different lengths of time, different types of employers and different amounts of ERC, the ERC has different rules. The ERC is affected by the following main factors:

How much an employer’s company was affected by the pandemic.
Employer’s number of employees in 2019 or 2021, and whether the employee worked or not.
What the employer paid each employee for their health insurance and during the pandemic

The employer has to fill out some forms and send them to the IRS to claim the ERC. The employer has to fill out the forms and show how much he paid his employees, as well their health insurance, to qualify for ERC. The IRS will then check the forms before giving the money to employers. The money can be used by the employer to pay for health insurance, to pay employees, or refunds on payroll taxes.

The ERC won’t be around forever. The ERC began in March 2020, and it will end in September 2022. The employer must claim ERC before the expiration date or when it becomes unavailable. Employers must also use the money well and not waste it. Employee Retention Credit Became

Here is more information about the ERC and its calculation.

Time Period

Different laws introduced, amended and terminated the ERC in 2020, 2021 and 2022. The amount of credit depends on the time frame for which it’s claimed. The table below summarises key features and differences for the ERC in each time frame:

Time Period	Law	Eligible Employers	Credit Rate	Qualified Wages
2020	CARES Act	Employers with business suspension or revenue decline of more than 50%	50% of qualified wages up to $10,000 per employee per year	Wages paid from March 13 to December 31, 2020
Q1-Q3 2021	CAA and ARPA	Employers with business suspension or revenue decline of more than 20%	70% of qualified wages up to $10,000 per employee per quarter	Wages paid from January 1 to September 30, 2021
Q3-Q4 2021 (Recovery Startup Business)	ARPA	Recovery startup businesses with average annual gross receipts of no more than $1 million,	70% of qualified wages up to $10,000 per employee per quarter (subject to a $50,000 cap per quarter),	Wages paid from July 1 to December 31, 2021,
Q4 2021 – Q3 2022 (Severely Financially Distressed Employer)	ARPA and IIJA	Employers with a revenue decline of more than 90%	70% of qualified wages up to $10,000 per employee per quarter	Wages paid from October 1, 2021, to September 30, 2022

Number of Employees

The number and type of employees can affect the definition and calculation for qualified wages and health care costs. According to the time frame and number of full-time equivalents (FTEs), an employer can be classified as a small employer or large employer. The table below summarizes all the rules and thresholds that determine an employer’s size.

Time Period	Small Employer Threshold	Large Employer Threshold
2020	Less than or equal to 100 FTEs in 2019	More than 100 FTEs in 2019
Q1-Q2 2021	Less than or equal to 500 FTEs in 2019	More than 500 FTEs in 2019
Q3-Q4 2021	Less than or equal to 500 FTEs in any calendar quarter in either calendar year beginning after December 31, 2019, and ending before July 1, 2021. If an employer did not have in either calendar year beginning after December 31, 2019, and ending before July 1, 2021, the employer is treated as a small eligible employer if it had less than or equal to 500 FTEs in any calendar quarter beginning after June 30, 2021. For recovery startup businesses, the employer size is irrelevant. For severely financially distressed employers, the employer size is irrelevant if the employer had a revenue decline of more than 90%. Otherwise, the same rules as Q1-Q2 2021 apply.	More than 500 FTEs in any calendar quarter in either calendar year beginning after December 31, 2019, and ending before July 1, 2021. If an employer did not exist in either calendar year beginning after December 31, 2019, and ending before July 1, 2021, the employer is treated as a large eligible employer if it had more than 500 FTEs in any calendar quarter beginning after June 30, 2021.

To count FTEs for a given year or quarter, an employer must use the following steps:

Count the number of employees who worked at least 30 hours per week (or at least 130 hours per month) for each month in the year or quarter
Add up the total hours worked by all other employees (who are not counted as FTEs) for each month in the year or quarter
Divide the total hours by120and round down to the nearest whole number
Add the number of FTEs from Step One and Step Three for each month in the year or quarter
Calculate the average number of FTEs by adding up the monthly totals and dividing by 12 (for a year) or 3 (for a quarter)

Qualified Wages & Health Insurance Costs

Qualified wages are wages paid to eligible employees during a period of business suspension or revenue decline. Other forms of compensation are also included in qualified wages, such as tips, bonuses and commissions. Qualified wage also includes the cost of health insurance for eligible employees. This may include premiums, deductibles, co-pays, or co-insurance.

The calculation of qualified wages, health insurance costs and employer size depends on the time period. The following table summarizes the rules and examples for different scenarios: Employee Retention Credit Became

Employer Size	Time Period	Qualified Wages and Health Insurance Costs	Example
Small	2020	All wages and health insurance costs paid to any employee, regardless of whether the employee worked or not	An employer with 80 FTEs in 2019 paid $8,000 in wages and $2,000 in health insurance costs to an employee in 2020. The employer had a revenue decline of more than 50% in Q2 2020. The qualified wages and health insurance costs for Q2 2020 are $10,000.
Small	Q1-Q3 2021	All wages and health insurance costs paid to any employee, regardless of whether the employee worked or not	An employer with 400 FTEs in 2019 paid $12,000 in wages and $3,000 in health insurance costs to an employee in Q1 2021. The employer had a revenue decline of more than 20% in Q1 2021. The qualified wages and health insurance costs for Q1 2021 are $15,000.
Small	Q3-Q4 2021 (Recovery Startup Business)	All wages and health insurance costs paid to any employee, regardless of whether the employee worked or not (subject to a $50,000 cap per quarter)	A recovery startup business that began operations in March 2020 paid $9,000 in wages and $1,000 in health insurance costs to an employee in Q3 2021. The business had average annual gross receipts of $800,000. The qualified wages and health insurance costs for Q3 2021 are $10,000.
Small	Q4 2021 – Q3 2022 (Severely Financially Distressed Employer)	All wages and health insurance costs paid to any employee, regardless of whether the employee worked or not	An employer with 600 FTEs in Q2 2019 paid $11,000 in wages and $4,000 in health insurance costs to an employee in Q4 2021. The employer had a revenue decline of more than 90% in Q4 2021. The qualified wages and health insurance costs for Q4 2021 are $15,000.
Large	2020	Wages and health insurance costs paid to an employee for the time that the employee did not work (up to the amount that the employee would have been paid for working an equivalent duration during the 30 days immediately preceding the period of economic hardship)	An employer with 120 FTEs in 2019 paid $10,000 in wages and $2,000 in health insurance costs to an employee who worked full-time (40 hours per week) in 2020. The employer had a business suspension due to a government order in April 2020. The employee did not work for two weeks in April 2020. The qualified wages and health insurance costs for April 2020 are $2,308 ($10,000 x2/52+$2,000 x2/52).
Large	Q1-Q3 2021	Wages and health insurance costs paid to an employee for the time that the employee did not work (up to the amount that the employee would have been paid for working an equivalent duration during the 90 days immediately preceding the period of economic hardship)	An employer with 550 FTEs in 2019 paid $15,000 in wages and $5,000 in health insurance costs to an employee who worked full-time (40 hours per week) in Q1 2021. The employer had a revenue decline of more than 20% in Q1 2021. The employee did not work for three weeks in Q1 2021. The qualified wages and health insurance costs for Q1 2021 are $5,769 ($15,000 x3/13+$5,000 x3/13).
Large	Q3-Q4 2021 (Severely Financially Distressed Employer)	All wages and health insurance costs paid to any employee, regardless of whether the employee worked or not (only if the employer had a revenue decline of more than 90%. Otherwise, the same rules as Q1-Q32021 apply.)	An employer with 700 FTEs in Q4 2019 paid $12,000 in wages and $6,000 in health insurance costs to an employee who worked full-time (40 hours per week) in Q4 2021. The employer had a revenue decline of more than 90% in Q4 2021. The qualified wages and health insurance costs

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Claim and Report the Credit

To claim the Employees Retention Credit, an employer must file with the Internal Revenue Service a federal Employment Tax Return (Form941) or a adjusted Employment Tax return (Form941X). The employer has to report each quarter the wages and costs of health insurance paid to employees who are eligible and the credit claimed.

Form 941

Form 941 allows employers to declare their quarterly federal taxes, including income taxes, Medicare and Social Security tax. Form 941 also allows the employer to claim the ERC for current or future quarters. The employer can use Form 941 to:

ERCs can be used to reduce the amount of tax that an employer must pay to the IRS.
Employers can request a payment in advance if their ERC is higher than the taxes they are required to pay. Employee Retention Credit Became
Any excess credit can be carried forward to the next quarter

Employers should avoid these common mistakes when filling out Form 941 and ensure that they are filled out correctly.

Use the newest version of the Form 941, which reflects changes to laws that impact the ERC.
The IRS has provided worksheets to help you calculate the ERC.
Use line 11c to report qualified wages paid and health insurance premiums paid to eligible employees
Use Line 13d for the credit claim amount per quarter
Use Line 13f to declare any advance payments received from the IRS.
If you need to receive an advance payment, use Line 24.
Use Line 25 to report any excess credit that can be carried forward to subsequent quarters
Sign the form 941, and attach any supporting documents.

The following are some resources and tips for filling in Form 941.

Use online services or electronic filing to submit Form 941 more quickly and securely
Check the IRS website for updates, FAQs, and guidance on Form 941 and the ERC
You can also contact a tax expert or the IRS for clarifications and assistance if you need it.

Form 941-X

Form 941-X is used to correct errors or make adjustments on a previously filed Form 941. Form 941 X also allows for the employer to claim ERC retroactively. Employers can use Form 941/X for Employee Retention Credit Became

Claim refunds or credits for taxes overpaid due to the ERC
Report any additional wages or health insurance costs that are paid to employees who are eligible but not reported on Form 951.
Correct any errors or omissions you find on Form 941, which may affect your credit claim.

Employers should avoid these common mistakes when filling out Form 941 X and ensure that they are filled out correctly.

Use the latest Form 941-X which reflects all the updates and changes made to the ERC by new laws.
The IRS has provided worksheets to help you calculate the ERC.
Use Part 2 to indicate the lines on Form 941 that are being corrected or adapted.
Use Part 3 to explain why Form 941 is being corrected or adjusted
Use Line 24 to declare any additional qualified wages or health insurance costs paid by eligible employees.
Line 25 is the place to enter any additional credit claims for each quarter.
You can use Line 26 to request a refund or credit due to claiming ERC.
Sign and date Form 941-X and attach any supporting documents or schedules

Some tips and resources for filling out Form 941-X are:

Fill out a separate form 941-X per quarter being corrected or recalculated Employee Retention Credit Became
Fill out Form 941-X immediately after you find an error in Form 941
Visit the IRS website to get the latest updates, FAQs, and guidance regarding Form 941-X, the ERC, and other forms.
You can also contact a tax expert or the IRS for clarification or additional assistance.

Deadline and Statute of Limitations

The deadline to submit Form 941 is usually the last day in the month following each quarter. For example for Q1 (2021) (January – March), Form 941 should be submitted by April 30, 2019. However, if an employer made timely deposits of all taxes due for a quarter, it can file Form 941 by the 10th day of the second month. After the end quarter. For example, the Q1 of 2021 is January-March. The Form 941 should be received by May 10th, 2021. Employee Retention Credit Became

The deadline for filing Form 941-X is generally three years from the date that the original Form 941 was filed or two years from the date that the tax was paid, whichever is later. For example, for Q1 2020 (January-March), Form 941 was due by April 30, 2020. If the employer has filed Forms 941 and paid tax by April 30th 2020, they have until April 30th 2023 to submit Form 941X. If an employer filed form 941 on April 30 2020 and paid the tax by June 15, 2020, then the deadline to file Form 941-X will be June 15, 2022.

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Conclusion

Employee Retention credit (ERC), a valuable benefit under tax law, can help employers who have been affected by COVID-19 keep their staff on payroll and minimize the impact of pandemic.

The ERC can be claimed by filing Form 941 or Form 941-X with the IRS and reporting the qualified wages and costs of health insurance paid to eligible workers. The ERC credit can be claimed with IRS Forms 941 or 941X by reporting to them the qualified health insurance and wages costs as well as the amount claimed each quarter.

This tax benefit is available to employers who meet the ERC’s eligibility criteria. The ERC does not last forever. It has a deadline, and there is a statute of limitations for claiming the ERC. Use the resources and tips provided in this article to ensure that you fill out your forms correctly and avoid common mistakes. You can contact the IRS for help or clarification, or you could consult a tax expert.

The ERC can make a big difference for your business or organization and your employees. It will help you to keep your employees, maintain a healthy cash flow, as well as recover from pandemic. This article is intended to help you better understand the ERC, and how it can be claimed. Stay safe and thank you for reading.

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Employee Retention Credit Became

What is the ERC?

The Employee Retention Credit is a tax credit for employers who retained their employees in their payroll during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The CARES Act created the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 in March 2021. Later, the CAA (Consolidated Appropriations Act), in December 2020, was amended and expanded by ARPA (American Rescue Plan Act of 2021), in March 2021.

Does everyone qualify for the ERC program?

Not everyone is eligible for the ERC. Employers only eligible for the ERC are those who have retained and paid wages to their employees between March 14, 2020 and Dec 31, 2021.

You can read more about the criteria here. Here are some highlights.

A government order has suspended the business or organization (wholly or partially) due to COVID-19.
The gross receipts of a calendar quarter for 2020 or 2021 were less than a percent of the gross receipts from a similar quarter in 2019.
They are a recovery startup business that began operations after February 15, 2020, and has average annual gross receipts of no more than $1 million.

How much does the ERC cost?

The amount of ERC a company or organization receives will depend on several factors.

Some of these include the time period and number of employees. Others are the amount paid in qualified wages or health insurance to eligible employees. If you want a more detailed explanation, read the above article.

How do I claim my ERC?

To claim ERC benefits, an employer needs to file Form 941X or federal employment tax reform with the IRS.

Employers must declare the wages and costs of health insurance paid to employees who qualify and the credit claimed each quarter.

When is the Deadline for Filing the ERC Forms?

There are two different deadlines to file the ERC Forms: Form 941 (Form 941-X) and Form 941 (941).

The last day for Form 941 in most cases is the last month following the end each quarter. While the deadline for the Form 941-X will be three years after you filled out the original Form 941. The deadline can be two years after the date the tax was paid. However, the latter date is preferred.