Important News: Flexible Spending Accounts (FSA)

1. Monthly-paid employees, who want to receive an FSA reimbursement in their December paychecks, need to submit claims to the Benefits Office no later than December 5 in order for timely payroll processing. This change in the payroll schedule for December is due to the holiday recess period. Participants have been notified of this December payroll deadline.

2. Participants with balances in their 2005 flexible spending accounts (FSA), who are still employed at Yale as of December 31, 2005, will be able to incur eligible expenses until March 15, 2006, the end of the IRS “grace period extension” to “use it” before “losing it.” Claims reimbursed from a 2005 FSA cannot be resubmitted to ADP for reimbursement from a 2006 FSA. That is, the employee cannot be reimbursed more than once for the same eligible expense. These 2005 claims must be received by the Benefits Office no later than April 30, 2006, to avoid forfeiting the balance. Letters have been mailed to participants’ home addresses with balance information.

3. To participate in a flexible spending account for the 2006 plan year, a new election needs to be made by December 16, 2005. FSA elections do not carry forward from year to year. Please direct employees to visit www.yale.edu/openenrollment for information regarding Automated Data Processing (ADP), the new administrator for claim reimbursement processing for the 2006 plan year. Useful tools, such as FSA calculators and lists of eligible expenses, are available to help make decisions. From this open enrollment site, employees will be able to access employee self-service for quick and easy enrollment. At the end of the enrollment process, enrollees should print a copy of the confirmation page for their file.