Now, though, that plan is being canceled because it does not meet the new law’s minimum standards, so she intends to sit down with her employees to shop on Healthcare.gov for individual coverage. She put off looking while the site’s technical problems were being addressed, but she likes what she has seen. “It looks like we’re all going to get better coverage and save money in the long run,” she said.

Kelly Fristoe, an insurance broker in Wichita Falls, Tex., estimates that the employees at nearly half of his small-group clients would be better off if the companies dropped their coverage, gave some of the savings directly to the workers and let them shop for their own insurance. Four clients have already decided to do that for 2014.

Steve Hooper, president of the Health Economics Group, a Rochester, N.Y., company that manages corporate benefit plans, said many of the workers in his region, including most of his own employees, have incomes low enough to qualify for the federal subsidies available to those who earn up to four times the federal poverty level, about $46,000 annually.

“We have a lot of part-time people and single moms with kids,” Mr. Hooper said. “The New York exchange offers some tremendous options for them that are better than anything else out there.”

A self-described data fanatic, Mr. Hooper, 74, spent months studying the law’s nuances and exploring various situations for his 25-person business. He knew what he paid his employees, but he did not know their overall household incomes. So he created a staff survey and arranged meetings with his employees to discuss their individual situations.

It became clear that many, especially those with children, would be better off without the option of buying company-sponsored insurance. Employees who have access to an “affordable” employer plan can buy a plan instead through the exchanges if they choose, but they cannot collect any subsidy that they would otherwise be eligible for. And those with children face an extra pitfall: The law’s calculation of “affordable” does not take into account the cost of adding dependents to the employer’s plan.

In 2013, to insure 11 workers, Mr. Hooper’s company contributed $283 a month for each employee toward health care premiums, covering more than 80 percent of the cost for an individual. Employees paid an additional $55 a month, or more if they needed coverage for dependents. For 2014, Mr. Hooper is taking the $30,000 to $40,000 he will save by canceling the group’s plan and using it to fund flexible spending accounts for each employee.