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Employer Shared Responsibility Provision
Based on the Employer Shared Responsibility Provisions, certain employers must offer health coverage to employees and their dependents:
100+ full-time employees – the provision will apply in 2015

50+ full-time employees – the provision will apply in 2016 (if you can certify that from 2/9/14 – 12/31/14 there was no reduction of workforce to get to the 50-99 range)

96% (approximately) of employers are small businesses with fewer than 50 workers and are exempt from the employer responsibility provisions and will not be penalized for choosing not to provide employee health coverage.
Source: U.S. Treasury Department

A Program in Flux
The program's parameters continue to fluctuate:
A hardship extension on the Individual Mandate was instituted for 2014, which means people who can prove they made a good faith effort to enroll in an exchange plan but could not will not be penalized.

An employer does not have to pay a non-coverage penalty for the first 80 employees in 2015.

Employers with plan years that do not start on January 1 will be able to begin compliance with employer responsibility at the start of their plan years in 2015.

Children who do not live in the U.S., Canada or Mexico, and are not U.S. citizens or nationals, are now excluded as being dependents (certain adopted children are excepted from this rule).

The U.S. Treasury Department acknowledges that changes have been made based on comments they have received and that other changes are being considered.

$2,000 - The current penalty for each full-time employee not offered coverage by applicable large employers.

Business's with less than 25 full-time employees could qualify for a Small Business Health Care Tax Credit if you cover at least 50% of them and their average annual wages are less than $50,000. Source: IRS

Full-Time-Equivalent Employees
Ashley Hissong, a certified patient protection and affordable care act professional for Landscape Contractors Insurance Services, points out that full-time-equivalent employees (FTEs), part -time employees whose combined hours add up to full-time hours, are counted towards a full-time employee total, but are not entitled to automatically receive health coverage. (If you have 99 full-time employees and 3 part-time employees whose combined hours equal one full-time employee, you are counted as having 100 full-time employees.)

Other Considerations
Seasonal employees: Those in positions for which the customary annual employment is six months or less generally will not be considered full-time employees.

Affordability Safe Harbors permit employers to use the wages they pay, their employees' hourly rates, or the federal poverty level in determining whether employer coverage is affordable under the Affordable Care Act.

To avoid a payment for failing to provide health coverage, employers need to offer coverage to 70 percent of their full-time employees in 2015 and 95 percent in 2016 and beyond. Source: U.S. Treasury Department