What Is a 1095-C Form? Codes, Deadlines, and Tax Use

A 1095-C form is a year-end tax document that large employers send to their full-time employees to report what health insurance was offered during the year, what it would have cost, and who was actually enrolled. You don’t attach it to your tax return. You keep it with your records and use it to check that your employer reported your coverage correctly, because the same information goes to the IRS and can affect whether you qualify for a premium tax credit on a Marketplace plan.

What the Form Tells the IRS

Federal law requires large employers to report health coverage offers to both the IRS and their workers each year.¹ Form 1095-C is that report. It shows whether your employer offered you coverage, what type of coverage it was, and how much you would have paid for the cheapest self-only plan.

The form matters to you for one main reason: the premium tax credit. That credit lowers monthly premiums on plans bought through the Health Insurance Marketplace. If your employer offered you affordable coverage that met the “minimum value” standard (a plan covering at least 60 percent of expected medical costs), you generally cannot claim the credit, even if you turned the plan down and bought a Marketplace policy instead.²³

For plan years beginning in 2026, employer coverage counts as affordable if your share of the premium for the cheapest self-only plan is no more than 9.96 percent of household income.⁴ The codes on your 1095-C tell the IRS which affordability test your employer applied, which is why the details are worth checking even if you never enrolled.

Who Receives a 1095-C

Employers classified as Applicable Large Employers must send Form 1095-C to every full-time employee. An employer qualifies as an ALE if it averaged at least 50 full-time employees (including full-time equivalents) during the prior calendar year. Full-time means at least 30 hours per week or 130 hours per month.⁵

If your employer runs a self-insured health plan, the reporting reaches further. Because the employer acts as its own insurer, it must report coverage for every enrolled person, including part-time employees and dependents.⁶ So a part-time worker enrolled in a self-insured plan will get a 1095-C, while a part-time worker with no employer coverage generally won’t.

Former employees can receive one too. If you left a job and enrolled in COBRA continuation through a self-insured employer plan, the employer reports that coverage in Part III. The COBRA offer itself isn’t treated as an offer of coverage in Part II, so you’ll typically see code 1H on Line 14 and code 2A on Line 16 for the months after your employment ended.⁷

A quick word on which “1095” you have. Form 1095-A comes from the Marketplace if you enrolled in a Marketplace plan, and it’s the form you need to reconcile a premium tax credit on Form 8962. Form 1095-B comes from insurers, government programs like Medicare or CHIP, and smaller employers. Form 1095-C is the large-employer version.⁸ It’s normal to get more than one in a year if your coverage changed.

What’s on the Form

Form 1095-C has three parts. Parts I and II appear on every form. Part III is completed only when the employer’s plan is self-insured.⁹

Part I is the identifying information: your name, address, and Social Security number, along with the employer’s name, address, and Employer Identification Number.

Part II is the month-by-month picture, and it’s the section that drives everything else. Line 14 uses a code to describe what coverage, if any, the employer offered that month. Line 15 shows the dollar amount you would have paid monthly for the cheapest self-only plan. Line 16 uses another code to note things like whether you were enrolled, whether the employer is claiming an affordability safe harbor, or whether you were employed and full-time that month.

Part III lists every person actually enrolled in the employer’s self-insured plan, including your spouse and dependents, with the months each person had coverage.

The Codes on Lines 14 and 16

The alphanumeric codes look cryptic, but a handful cover most situations.⁹ On Line 14, code 1A signals a qualifying offer of minimum-value coverage at a low employee cost with at least some coverage offered to spouse and dependents. Code 1E means minimum-value coverage was offered to you, your spouse, and your dependents. Code 1H means no offer of coverage, or coverage that didn’t qualify as minimum essential coverage; it also fills in months when you weren’t employed.

On Line 16, code 2C means you were enrolled every day of the month. Codes 2F, 2G, and 2H flag the three affordability safe harbors employers can use (W-2 wages, the federal poverty line, or rate of pay). Code 2A appears in months you weren’t employed there. Code 2B is used for months you weren’t full-time. Code 2D covers waiting periods and initial measurement periods when the employer wasn’t yet required to offer you coverage.

Compare the codes and monthly amounts against your own records: pay stubs showing premium deductions, enrollment confirmations, or coverage letters. If Line 14 shows 1H for a month you know you were offered coverage, or Line 16 shows 2C for a month you weren’t enrolled, that’s a signal to ask HR for a correction.

When to Expect the Form in 2026

For the 2025 tax year (the forms distributed and filed during 2026), employers must provide Form 1095-C to employees by March 2, 2026. Paper filing with the IRS is also due March 2, 2026, and electronic filing is due March 31, 2026. Employers filing 10 or more information returns of any type must file electronically.⁹

Starting in 2024, employers are no longer required to automatically mail Form 1095-C to every employee. An employer can instead post a clear notice on its website letting employees know they can request a copy. The notice has to stay up through October 15 of the filing year, and once you request the form, the employer has 30 days to send it. If nothing has arrived by mid-March 2026, check the company’s benefits site or contact HR.

How to Use It at Tax Time

You do not attach Form 1095-C to your tax return, and you do not mail it in. The IRS already has its own copy from your employer.⁸ Treat it as reference material. Check that the coverage months and codes match your records, and file it with your other tax documents.

You also don’t have to wait for the form to file your return. Insurance cards, explanation-of-benefits statements, pay stubs, and enrollment records are acceptable documentation if you need to confirm coverage.⁸

If you had a Marketplace plan and received advance premium tax credit payments, the form you need to complete Form 8962 is Form 1095-A, from the Marketplace, not Form 1095-C.¹⁰ But the 1095-C still matters in that situation: if it shows your employer offered affordable, minimum-value coverage, the IRS may determine you weren’t eligible for the credit, and you could have to repay some or all of the advance payments.² That’s the scenario worth double-checking the codes for.

Fixing Mistakes on Your Form

If something on your 1095-C is wrong, whether it’s your Social Security number, a coverage code, or a monthly premium amount, contact your employer and ask for a corrected form. The employer has to issue a new Form 1095-C marked “CORRECTED” and update its filing with the IRS.⁹

One narrow exception applies to small dollar errors on Line 15. If no single monthly premium amount is off by more than $100, a safe harbor generally protects the employer from correction penalties, and the employer may not issue a corrected form unless you specifically request one. You can still ask, and if you think even a small discrepancy could affect your premium tax credit, request the correction. The employer must comply.

The Federal Mandate Is $0, but Your State May Not Be

The Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate is still on the books, but the federal penalty has been $0 since 2019, so going without coverage doesn’t create an IRS bill.¹¹ The reason Form 1095-C still lands in your mailbox (or on your benefits portal) is the premium tax credit system: the IRS uses it to check whether an employer’s offer of coverage made you ineligible for a subsidized Marketplace plan.

A handful of states and the District of Columbia enforce their own coverage requirements with financial penalties. If you live in one of those jurisdictions, your 1095-C can help serve as proof of coverage for state tax purposes. Check with your state tax agency for its specific rules.

1
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 6056 – Certain Employers Required to Report on Health Insurance Coverage
2
Internal Revenue Service. Eligibility for the Premium Tax Credit
3
Internal Revenue Service. Minimum Value and Affordability
4
Internal Revenue Service. Rev. Proc. 2025-25
5
Internal Revenue Service. Determining if an Employer Is an Applicable Large Employer
6
Internal Revenue Service. Questions and Answers on Employer Shared Responsibility Provisions Under the Affordable Care Act
7
Internal Revenue Service. Questions and Answers About Information Reporting by Employers on Form 1094-C and Form 1095-C
8
Internal Revenue Service. Questions and Answers About Health Care Information Forms for Individuals
9
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Forms 1094-C and 1095-C (2025)
10
Internal Revenue Service. Health Insurance Marketplace Statements
11
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 5000A – Requirement to Maintain Minimum Essential Coverage