Do I need to report contributions on my employees’ W2s?

No. The MERIT program is structured as a payroll deduction IRA and not as a traditional retirement plan that needs to be reported on your employees’ W2s. The IRA trustee for the MERIT program will file “Form 5498, IRA Contributions Information” with the IRS (as needed for your employees) and will send employees a copy for their records, no later than May 31 of each year.