Comments on: Your Flexible Spending Account (FSA) After a Layoff

By: Erin

Erin — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 23:42:14 +0000

I want to warn everyone to be extremely careful about their FSA if you’ve been laid-off. I was laid-off in February and was never told by the HR department or Sheakley (the plan administrator) that I had until the beginning of the following month to use the money I earned and set aside for my family’s healthcare expenses or they would be forfeited.

Furthermore, I received a letter from Sheakley in mid-April stating that I had X dollars in my account and had until X date to incur expenses and X date to submit expenses, both of which were incorrect according to their rules. Not to mention, I received the letter about a month and a half after I would’ve been able to incur expenses that were eligible for submission!

After contacting Sheakley and my old company, they both said that the copy within the letter, “In addition, if you have terminated employment or coverage during the plan year, please refer to your Summary Plan Description regarding claim submission dates” covers them. However, I don’t think that people reading this letter would understand that “claim submission due dates” and “dates for incurring expenses” are the same thing. Clearly they’re not in my view, especially when I received the denial letter. Interesting that they said that my “claim” was denied, so clearly the claim is the form for submitting expenses.

And funny how you’re not given the Summary Plan Description unless you ask for it…everything seems to work in their favor, not yours.

By: employeescorned

employeescorned — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 05:34:37 +0000

i got laid off and had a negative FSA balance at the time of termination. My HR dept. is now telling me that im not elig.for Cobra because of the negative balance. Can they do this??

By: BillyOceansEleven

BillyOceansEleven — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 14:41:29 +0000

When several of us were downsized last year, we found out our firm’s policy on your FSA was that you could keep it for the remainder of the year, however they would charge you a 2.5% fee monthly on your unclaimed balance. Thankfully our FSA benefit was on my wife’s benefits (although she worked for the same firm), but this could end up costing quite a bit if you have a large balance.

By: thomas

thomas — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 05:21:49 +0000

Luckily I don’t have enough health spending to warrant an FSA at this time. They do provide a great benefit for those who do have large health expenses and need to skim off their taxable income.

By: Gene

Gene — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 20:16:24 +0000

My FSA contributions and our medical bills were pretty evenly matched when I was downsized in Sept. So we went a different route and asked my employer to put the scheduled Oct-Dec contributions into my severance package instead. There was some back-and-forth with the HR department to sort out the details, but I got the switch made. The tradeoff is that we had no FSA coverage for those three months, but decided to take a chance on luck, general good health, and a nearby dental school for routine cleanings, etc. that were due in that interim.

By: Daniel

Daniel — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 18:48:21 +0000

I had used up my entire FSA balance when I was laid off, and my employer didn’t say a word about it. I then started on COBRA, which I’m still on, and they switched to an HSA. The cool thing about an HSA is that contribution rules mirror those of an IRA. Point is: if I secure employment prior to April 15, 2009, I can contribute the HSA max for 2008, regardless of what type of plan the new employer has.

I sure hope I find something soon – I really want to make that contribution!