COBRA Compliance Checklist for HR Teams

4/18/2026

A COBRA compliance checklist has to cover six things: confirming the plan is subject to COBRA, issuing the general notice, catching every qualifying event, meeting each notice deadline, administering elections and premiums correctly, and ending coverage only on a permitted ground with the right notice. Most COBRA failures are not misunderstandings of the law; they are steps that nobody owned. The checklist below is organized by stage so each item can be assigned to a specific person or vendor.

1. Confirm Coverage and Scope

Headcount test. Federal COBRA applies to group health plans of employers with 20 or more employees on more than 50 percent of typical business days in the prior calendar year. Part-time employees count as a fraction. Re-run the test each January and keep the worksheet.
Exempt plans. Church plans and federal government plans are outside federal COBRA. If you believe you are exempt, document why.
State continuation laws. Many states have mini-COBRA laws that reach smaller employers or add rights on top of federal COBRA. List every state where you have covered employees and note which law applies to each insured plan.
Which plans are covered. Medical, dental, vision, health FSAs and some employee assistance programs are group health plans. Keep an inventory so a stand-alone dental or vision plan is not forgotten.

2. Plan Documents and the General Notice

Confirm the plan document and summary plan description describe COBRA rights and the procedures beneficiaries must follow to give notice.
Send the general (initial) notice within 90 days after an employee's plan coverage begins, and address it to the spouse as well when the spouse is covered.
Re-send when a spouse is newly added to coverage.
Keep proof of mailing for each notice, not just a statement that the system sends them.

3. Capture Every Qualifying Event

This is where most compliance programs leak. A qualifying event is anything that would cause a covered person to lose coverage, and several of them never reach HR through the termination workflow. Our guide to what counts as a COBRA qualifying event covers the full list; the operational checklist is:

Terminations, voluntary and involuntary, flow from HRIS or payroll to whoever issues COBRA notices.
Reductions in hours that end benefits eligibility (a move to part-time, an unpaid leave that ends coverage, a seasonal schedule change) are flagged the same way as terminations.
Deaths of covered employees are routed to benefits, not only to payroll.
Medicare entitlement of an employee is captured where it causes dependents to lose coverage.
Employees are reminded, in the general notice and in open-enrollment material, that they must report divorce, legal separation and a child losing dependent status.
Any decision to treat a termination as gross misconduct goes to counsel before COBRA is denied. The exception is narrow and frequently challenged.

4. Meet the Notice Deadlines

Put each deadline on a calendar that someone reviews weekly. The detail behind each clock is in our post on COBRA notice deadlines.

Employer notifies the plan administrator within 30 days of a termination, reduction in hours, death or Medicare entitlement.
Administrator sends the election notice within 14 days of receiving that notice. Where the employer is also the administrator, the combined window is generally 44 days.
Qualified beneficiaries notify the plan within 60 days of a divorce, legal separation or loss of dependent status.
A notice of unavailability goes out when someone asks for COBRA and is not entitled to it.
A notice of early termination goes out when coverage ends before the maximum period.

5. Administer Elections and Premiums

Allow an election period of at least 60 days, measured from the later of loss of coverage or the date the election notice is provided.
Treat each qualified beneficiary as having an independent election right.
Allow 45 days after election for the initial premium and a grace period of at least 30 days for each later payment.
Charge no more than 102 percent of the applicable premium (150 percent during the disability extension months).
Judge timeliness by the date payment was sent, not the date it arrived.
Treat a shortfall that is not significant (the lesser of $50 or 10 percent of the amount due) as full payment unless you notify the beneficiary and allow 30 days to pay the difference.

The mechanics are covered in COBRA election and payment rules and how to bill for COBRA premiums.

6. Track Duration and Extensions

Record the maximum coverage period for each beneficiary at the start: 18 months for termination or reduction in hours, 36 months for other events. See how long COBRA coverage lasts.
Diary the disability extension (to 29 months) and second-qualifying-event extension (to 36 months), including the deadlines for beneficiaries to tell you about them.
Diary the end date and prepare the end-of-coverage communication in advance.

7. End Coverage Only on a Permitted Ground

Confirm the reason for any early end is one the law allows: nonpayment, the employer ceasing to offer any group health plan, post-election coverage under another group plan or Medicare entitlement, or termination for cause on the same basis as an active employee. The details are in when an employer can terminate COBRA coverage.
Send the early termination notice stating the reason, the effective date and any rights to other coverage.

8. Recordkeeping

For every qualified beneficiary, keep the qualifying event and its date, when the employer notified the administrator, when the election notice was sent and how, the election and its date, the premium history with postmark evidence, any shortfall or grace-period correspondence, and the termination notice. The plan bears the burden of showing it complied, so the file has to prove each step without anyone's memory.

9. Oversee Your Vendor

Using a third-party administrator does not transfer liability. The employer still has to tell the administrator about qualifying events on time. Once a year, pull a sample of terminations and reductions in hours and confirm each produced a timely election notice with proof of delivery. Our post on employer requirements under COBRA explains why that handoff is the most common failure point.

10. Train the People Who Touch the Process

COBRA involves HR, payroll, benefits and managers, and a deadline gets missed whenever one of them fails to recognize an event. HRTrainingCenter.com's COBRA Training and Certification Program covers qualifying events, notice deadlines, election and premium administration for HR staff and third-party administrators. Teams handling leave alongside benefits can use the Integrating FMLA, ADA, COBRA and Workers' Compensation program, since unpaid leave is one of the most common hidden COBRA triggers.

Frequently Asked Questions

How often should we review our COBRA process?

At least annually: rerun the headcount test, check notices against current plan terms and audit a sample of files. Review sooner after a plan change, a vendor change or an acquisition.

Does a small employer need a COBRA checklist?

Yes. Below 20 employees federal COBRA may not apply, but state continuation laws often do, and the same steps of notice, election and payment usually apply in some form.

Who should own the checklist?

One named person, usually in benefits or HR, with each step assigned to an individual or vendor. Shared ownership is how qualifying events get missed.

What is the most commonly missed step?

A reduction in hours that ends benefits eligibility. It does not go through the termination workflow, so no notice is triggered unless someone flags it.

Is a checklist enough to prove compliance?

No. The checklist organizes the work; the documentation for each beneficiary is what proves it was done.