Pre-Tax Benefits

Offering employees a pre-tax benefit is a great way to encourage and reward employees for using an alternate commute mode of transportation.

Effective January 1, 2007 - There is an increase in qualified parking exclusion and no change to commuter transportation benefit. For 2007, the monthly exclusion for qualified parking increases to $215 and the monthly exclusion for commuter highway vehicle transportation and transit passes remains at $110.

TMA Delaware encourages all Delaware employers to offer this valued employee benefit. Depending on business resources and personal choice, employers are encouraged to use the regional voucher program, TransitChek, or the nationwide, commuter benefits solution provider, WageWorks, to administer the benefit. TMA members can also utilize the TMA for distribution of transit tickets to your employees.

Please call the TMA Delaware office at (302) 658-9001 for information.

WageWorks is the only company to offer a totally automated pre-tax commuter benefits solution that addresses the needs of employers, employees, and transportation service providers. WageWorks' services offer transit nationwide, including paperless Web or phone enrollment.

WageWorks tax-favored benefit solutions are 100% compliant with the final IRS regulations, and employees save time and money--up to 40% of the cost of transportation. With WageWorks, employees elect to purchase their transit passes using pre-tax dollars. These amounts are deducted from the employee's paycheck and transit passes are mailed directly to the employee's home or office.

As you might know, transportation fringe benefit plans offer significant payroll tax savings. You don't lose these by using WageWorks. In fact, along with being fully compliant with the final regulations, and extremely beneficial to employees, many realize a net tax savings, after paying the WageWorks fee.

TransitChek enables employers of any size to help reduce the cost of employees' commutes on public transit or vanpools. TransitChek is a voucher that can be used at authorized transit outlets to purchase tickets, tokens and passes. TransitCheks come in denominations of $15, $20, $30, $35, $60 and $65, and are valid for 13 months from a company's purchase order date.

Employers can make TransitCheks available to employees in three different ways:

1. Employees at participating companies can elect to purchase TransitCheks through a pre-tax payroll deduction.
2. Employers can give employees TransitCheks in addition to their salary as part of their benefits package.
3. Employers and employees can share the cost of TransitCheks. For example, employers can "sell" $30 TransitCheks for $15.