Forms 1095 (Health Coverage Information Forms)

Forms 1095 are a family of Affordable Care Act information returns that report a person's health coverage for the year to the IRS and to the person. The IRS calls them health coverage information forms. Form 1095-A, Health Insurance Marketplace Statement, is issued by the Marketplace to people who enrolled in a plan there. Form 1095-B, Health Coverage, is issued by health insurers outside the Marketplace, government programs such as Medicare and the Children's Health Insurance Program, and some smaller employers with self-insured plans. Form 1095-C, Employer-Provided Health Insurance Offer and Coverage, is issued by an applicable large employer, generally one with 50 or more full-time employees counting full-time equivalents in the prior year.

The forms look alike and do different jobs. Form 1095-A carries the numbers a household needs to calculate its premium tax credit, so it is a filing document in the same way a Form W-2 is. Forms 1095-B and 1095-C mainly record who was covered and, for 1095-C, what coverage an employer offered. The IRS's own description is that, much like Forms W-2 and 1099, they are provided to the IRS by the same entity that provides them to you.

Form 1095-A is the one with consequences. The Marketplace, not the IRS, sends it, and it must be furnished by January 31 for the prior year's coverage. It shows the months of coverage, the monthly enrollment premium, the premium of the applicable second lowest cost silver plan (Part III, column B) and the advance payments of the premium tax credit made to the insurer each month. Those are the inputs to Form 8962, and a household that had advance payments made on its behalf must file a return and Form 8962 to reconcile them even if it would not otherwise have to file. The IRS's instruction is direct: "You should wait to receive your Form 1095-A before filing your taxes." If the second-lowest-cost silver plan figure is wrong because a move or a family change was never reported, the taxpayer must work out the correct figure, and a corrected or voided 1095-A may require an amended return. Catastrophic plans and stand-alone dental plans are not reported on Form 1095-A at all.

Form 1095-B is a record of coverage. It reports individuals covered by minimum essential coverage, which is why it once mattered: it was proof against the individual shared responsibility payment. That payment has been zero for months beginning after December 31, 2018, so a federal return no longer depends on it. Under a law enacted at the end of 2024, a provider meets its duty to furnish Form 1095-B if it posts a clear notice on its website that the form is available on request and sends a copy by the later of January 31 or 30 days after a request, so a person can stop receiving one in the mail without anything having gone wrong. Where a state runs its own coverage requirement, its return may still ask for proof of coverage.

Form 1095-C answers an employer question and a credit question. Part II reports the coverage the employer offered each month and is used to determine whether the employer owes a payment under the employer shared responsibility rules of section 4980H. For an employee, Part II matters only if they or their family bought Marketplace coverage, because an offer of affordable employer coverage can make them ineligible for the premium tax credit. Part III, filled in only when the employer's plan is self-insured, lists who was covered, and in that case the employer's 1095-C takes the place of a 1095-B. An employee receives a 1095-C if they were full-time for at least one month or were enrolled in the employer's self-insured plan, even part-time. The same 2024 law lets an employer meet its duty to a full-time employee by posting a website notice and sending Form 1095-C when asked, and IRS Notice 2025-15 applies it to statements for 2024 and later years.

Getting more than one is normal. Someone who changed jobs, moved between Marketplace and employer coverage, or had family members on different plans can receive several. The IRS's guidance is the same each time: use the 1095-A for Form 8962, keep the others with your tax records, and send none of them with the return.

1. Identify which form you should expect. Marketplace coverage at any point in the year produces a 1095-A. Coverage from an insurer outside the Marketplace, Medicare, Medicaid or the Children's Health Insurance Program produces a 1095-B, if the provider sends one. Work for an applicable large employer produces a 1095-C.
2. Wait for the 1095-A, not for the others. A household that had Marketplace coverage needs the 1095-A to complete Form 8962. A copy can be downloaded from a HealthCare.gov account, and a state Marketplace account may offer one too. Forms 1095-B and 1095-C are not required to file.
3. Check the 1095-A. If a figure is wrong, or the form never arrives, contact the Marketplace, which issues corrected and voided forms.
4. File, and keep every form. None of the forms is attached to the return. The issuers send their copies to the IRS separately.

For example, Teodoro was on a Marketplace plan from January through June and enrolled in his new employer's plan in July. His Form 1095-A shows six months of coverage at a monthly enrollment premium of $612 and advance credit payments of $390 a month, so the annual totals are 6 × $612 = $3,672 of premium and 6 × $390 = $2,340 of advance payments. Those six months, and only those, go onto his Form 8962, where the credit he was actually entitled to on his real income is compared with the $2,340 already paid to the insurer. His employer, an applicable large employer with an insured plan, sends a Form 1095-C showing the coverage it offered from July, and the insurer may send a Form 1095-B for the months he was covered under the employer's plan. Neither of those changes Form 8962, because Teodoro was not buying Marketplace coverage in the months the employer offered its plan.

Pros

• Form 1095-A gives a Marketplace household every figure Form 8962 needs, in the Marketplace's own numbers, which the IRS will compare against the return.
• Forms 1095-B and 1095-C give a durable record of who was covered and what an employer offered, useful if a premium tax credit or a state coverage requirement is ever questioned.
• Because none of the forms is attached to the return, a missing 1095-B or 1095-C does not hold up filing.

Cons

• Three forms with near-identical names confuse people into either waiting for a 1095-B that may never be mailed or filing without the 1095-A they actually need.
• An error on Form 1095-A flows straight into the credit calculation, and a corrected or voided form can mean amending a return already filed.
• The second-lowest-cost silver plan figure on Form 1095-A can be wrong for months in which a move or a family change was not reported, leaving the taxpayer to find the right figure.
• Because insurers and employers may now send Forms 1095-B and 1095-C only on request, a household that needs one, for a state coverage requirement or a premium tax credit question, may have to ask for it.