Qualifying wages for Employee Retention Credit (ERC) can be a bit complicated! This tax credit was established to help businesses keep and pay employees during the coronavirus pandemic. But it's important to know exactly what qualifies as wages, so you can take advantage of this opportunity.

First off, ERC is available for wages paid after March 12, 2020 through December 31, 2020. The eligible employer must have had operations partially or fully suspended due to a governmental order related to COVID-19 that limits commerce, travel or group meetings. In addition, employers with more than 100 full-time employees in 2019 are limited to qualifying wages paid only for periods when their operations are either completely suspended or there is a significant decline in gross receipts compared to the same quarter in the prior year.

Transition: Even if an employer meets these criteria, there are other requirements that must be met.

The IRS defines "qualifying wages" as any payment of salary, wage, vacation pay, severance pay and other similar types of compensation that you would norm'lly pay your employee(s). Qualifying wages also include health care benefits like medical and dental premiums or retirement plan contributions made on behalf of employees. However, employers cannot count payments made with funds received under the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) toward qualifying wages for ERC purposes!

To sum up: if you meet all the requirements for ERC then your qualified wages will include salaries and other forms of compensation such as health care benefits and retirement plan contributions but not PPP payments! With some careful attention to eligibility guidelines and proper documentation you could get valuable tax credits from ERC!