Does anyone here use a Flex Spending Account for childcare?

[Deleted]

I should do this, no?


Our HR department is pretty non-existent so I am kind of lost but my company offers this and I am now eligible.


Do any of y'all use this?

[Deleted]

Don't make me go to MM.

[liverandonions]

Yes, and yes.

[looseseal]

Yes, I do use it, and I agree that you should take advantage. Super easy!

[Deleted]

So the idea is that your money goes into an account pre-tax and you can use that account to pay your childcare bill??

[liverandonions]

You can only get the max amount once, so both you and your husband can't do it. But if it's like mine it's $5000 pretax dollars annually. It's been a pretty easy process for us too. Our DCP will write a receipt for our monthly payment. We turn them in with a form from my husbands school district and we get reimbursed.

They even said if you're having a parent watch them, just have them write receipts. Don't quote me on that though

[tigress]

Yes I do it.

[Deleted]

I love the idea, but our FSA caps are so SO much lower than our total childcare costs that the trouble just isn't worth it. Lazy, party of one.

[marshmallowmars]

Yes I use it. How mine works is my employer will take a certain amount out of my check ($5,000/26 paychecks). After I've accrued enough in my FSA Account I just log on to the website, email them an invoice from my provider, and they send me a refund check. I do this a few times a year until I get up to the $5,000 I put in.

[iammalcolmx]

No but I work HR and a lot of people here do it. Pretty much everyone here does the max of 5000. If you are paid bi-weekly and do the max is 192.31 a pay period. The people here file claims and receive a check to reimburse them for their daycare expenses.

[Kristinmo]

Yes I use it. I wish it was more than $5K but I take advantage of what I can.

[LLL]

yes. you should absolutely take advantage.

[ssmjlm]

Do it!

The max is $5k per family, but for us it's worth it.

Even though that's only 5 months of care.

[Deleted]

Yep. I do. Unlike a healthcare FSA, you have to accrue it before you can claim it so we typically just cash it out twice a year so we get it in big chunks.

[wkatie]

I do the full $5k (should be more). Mine you can set up as a recurring expense if you have fixed monthly care. So I file one form in January, then they reimburse me each month via direct deposit.

[cinderbella]

Just remember that Medical FSA and Dependent Care FSA are totally different - you can't use one for the other so make sure you sign up for the correct one

[youbetcha]

We did. I always hoarded the receipts until May or so and then submitted them. Our daycare was so expensive that I never had to submit anymore after that. But THEN a check for like 2K would show up and it was awesome. And then after that a check for $212 would show up twice a month with no more effort on my part. Since it was taken out of H's paycheck already we didn't really "miss" it.

Practically it does lower your taxable income, so it is good in that way, yada yada yada. But I always looked at it like YAY FREE MONEY!

[CurlyQ284]

Yes I use the full $5000. It lowers my taxable income and I submit the receipts and have $2k deposited into my account. I can use that for whatever. The last reimbursement paid for Christmas.

[bella427]

I did the math and using the FSA ends up saving me about $100 a month. It's kind of a pain to submit the paperwork but I need the $100, so it's worth it.

[sarahswim]

Yes, we use it and submit it twice a year; once right before Christmas and that becomes our Christmas present money. It's really easy.

[CurlyQ284]

Mar 20, 2014 12:17:18 GMT -5 mekiakoo said:

I'm trying to understand how this works.

So you get the money deducted from your pay check pre tax and it goes into the flex account. And you can't use any of them until it hits your max then you can be reimbursed? So I actually will be "paying" twice as much for child care until I get reimbursed?

Or can you be reimbursed every time you pay for child care? Even if its weekly?

Will the daycare need to work with me on this or is this only between me and my job?

You can get reimbursed as often as you submit receipts. I just save them up a while. The only thing daycare does is give you receipts when you pay and they have to give your their federal tax ID or if its a person then their SSN.

[savan]

Mar 20, 2014 12:17:18 GMT -5 mekiakoo said:

I'm trying to understand how this works.

So you get the money deducted from your pay check pre tax and it goes into the flex account. And you can't use any of them until it hits your max then you can be reimbursed? So I actually will be "paying" twice as much for child care until I get reimbursed?

Or can you be reimbursed every time you pay for child care? Even if its weekly?

Will the daycare need to work with me on this or is this only between me and my job?

You can only get out as much as you put in.  Since the $5000 is distributed across paychecks, i.e. you only put in about $420 per month, you can only get out ~$420 per month, even if you paid more in childcare.  

A lot of people continue to submit for reimbursement their actual childcare payments, so at some point early in the year they reach $5000 in childcare payments and just get automatically reimbursed as they put in for the rest of the year.  We choose to wait until the end of the year and just get the $5000 in lump sum.  It's like a bonus check for us.

You do have to get your childcare provider to sign the paperwork or provide receipts for reimbursement.  If you are paying under the table in cash, your provider doesn't claim the money on taxes, you can't use it.  

[LLL]

Mar 20, 2014 11:20:21 GMT -5 jillianashley6 said:

I use it. My tax accountant H told me to. lol

We take out the max- $5K. Which comes out to about $420/month I think. Basically, we don't depend on that money. We don't budget it, etc. Which works because I often forget to submit....so I'll go a few months and forget to submit, and then all of a sudden remember and we'll get $700-1000 all at once, and its like a bonus.

This is probably not the MM way to do this, but it works for us.

We're the same way. We probably only end up submitting twice a year, oopsies.

[CurlyQ284]

Mar 20, 2014 12:29:40 GMT -5 mekiakoo said:

It must be used up within a year, right? Otherwise I don't get the money back?

Correct.

[Deleted]

Ugh, I forgot to enroll for this.

[leia221]

We do use it, and some of the things that people have mentioned vary by employer (or maybe plan administrator?). I don't have to submit anything for reimbursement, I get a debit card that I use to pay for daycare that is linked to that account only. I also don't have to wait for the money to come out of my paychecks and get into the account before I spend it. So, I'll spend all of my $5k in the next couple of months, but money will be coming out of my paycheck for the rest of the year to reach the $5K. Obviously if I changed jobs I'd have to do something about that, but I've done this for a few years and it's worked great for us.

[badtzmaru22]

We participate. The company that runs mine has an app, so I just take pictures of the receipts and upload them through the app. Easy.

[BAMFMrsB]

Mar 20, 2014 12:33:21 GMT -5 @aliciaroset said:

We submit at the end of each month since we can only get reimbursed for care that has already been used, not future care.

same here.

The $$$ is taken out, pre-tax, from my paycheck. At the beginng on the next month DC sends me an email with DS' tuition amount for the last month, that I already paid. Then I log in to my benefits subscriber page, choose "dependant care" section and there is a reimbursement form that I print off and fax in. I'm supposed to be able to email it, but that always gets messed up.  Then, in a few days, I get whatever amount I had 'banked' back. It direct deposits into my checking.

I know some people will hoarde those tuition receipts, wait until the end of the year, then take the entire amount back at one time. To each, their own.

[fryjack2]

Mar 20, 2014 11:11:51 GMT -5 @lazerus24 said:

So the idea is that your money goes into an account pre-tax and you can use that account to pay your childcare bill??

Yup.  We have to send in a copy of our nanny's paycheck and a letter from her stating that the payments were for childcare.

We can even use it for preschool next year

Look into seeing if your H has it available to him as well.  My H doesn't, but it would have been awesome if he did.

[fryjack2]

The only annoying thing about mine is that I wish it all came out at once instead of over the year. We go through that 5k in 2 months. But I don't get credited until the money is in my account, which takes awhile since some amounts come out each paycheck.