Not provided complete information on Dependent care flex account

[Antigone*]

I didnt come on here to get attacked.

thanks for nothing.

I'm assuming noone on here has ever had a newborn with complete lack of sleep, working full time and expects the HR department to do their job. I got back from maternity leave with only a few days to make my elections. And no- I dont have all the time in the world to look everything up- I do my best but its not easy.

Im done here.....feel free to continuing being jerks to a very stressed out mama. Shame on the lot of you.

Pity that you just don't get it. Off you go.

 

[swalsh411]

As a new parent I shouldnt have to go traipsing around the web looking for information on something that should just be provided with my enrollment package.

Translation: I don't want to be reponsible for my own financial matters and believe every question I have should be answered by somebody else and I am unwilling/unable to look up anything on my own. Seriously. Google. 30 seconds. 4 months old sleep all the time. Don't tell me you didn't have time to look it up on your own. Other parents do not buy that nonsense. You just didn't feel like it and made a huge assumption that turned out to be wrong now you want to blame somebody else.

My HR should have provided this information upfront. It seems as though not providing it was shady.

Despite what they say, HR works for the company, not for the employees. Besides, what possible reason would they have to be "shady"? They have nothing to gain by you enrolling or not enrolling. You might have a crummy and unresponsible HR department, which is unfortunate, but this is information you could have easily gotten on your own. Especially after you knew enough to ask and didn't get an answer.

Thats just rude and unhelpful. No- I have a 4 month old and should be able to rely on my HR department being forthcoming with information on plan options.

I'm sorry you received legally correct answers and not the answers you were hoping for.

 

[commentator]

One you've had a few dry weeks, where you are paying both day care and having the amount taken from your paycheck, you will start submitting the day care expenses, and you'll be getting them back regularly, so you won't be out any money, you're just paying for it ahead (with pre tax dollars) and then getting reimbursed for it as you submit the bills. I did this for years when I had small children, living very much paycheck to paychedk, and the tax savings was well worth the trouble of submitting the claims (and postage too, at that time!)

You're not going to get anyone to say you should've been spoon fed this information, or that the employer not doing this for you was a breach of contract since this has been the way these dependent child care programs operated from their inception, which was quite a while ago. I susupect there's literature out there in your place of work that would explain it if you did the most cursory check on it or if you had discussed it with HR. You assumed it would work like the medical account, that's all.

 

[Zigner]

I didnt come on here to get attacked.

thanks for nothing.

I'm assuming noone on here has ever had a newborn with complete lack of sleep, working full time and expects the HR department to do their job. I got back from maternity leave with only a few days to make my elections. And no- I dont have all the time in the world to look everything up- I do my best but its not easy.

Im done here.....feel free to continuing being jerks to a very stressed out mama. Shame on the lot of you.

You know what the say about assuming...

Where's my violin?

 

[cbg]

I'd be willing to place a moderate amount of money on this scenario, since I've seen it so very many times before.

The information is in the materials they were sent, probably on their website, and available in about six different places. However, the poster failed to read any of it and expected someone to sit down with her and talk her through the process. It being the busiest time of the year for HR, they didn't have time to do one-on-one sit-downs with employees to tell them information they could read on their own. Therefore, she was "not told" and HR "didn't do their jobs".

Well, pooh on her then. It's not HR's job to provide spoon feeding. There is such a thing as personal responsibility and reading the material you're sent.

We put in big red letters on the election forms, had pop-up windows with the information on the online enrollment screens, and sent out special emails directly telling people that dependent care FSA's are for daycare, NOT for medical expenses for dependents. It's on our website at least twice; it's in the open enrollment materials, and also in the new hire materials. But when we sent out an email saying, "If you elected a dependent care FSA thinking it was for dependent's medical expenses, call us before the new plan year starts so you can fix it" we got at least 50 calls.

At least our OP got that much.

 

[TinkerBelleLuvr]

The OP thinks there are no parents here. Um, may of us our parents - we KNOW sleeplessness, etc. My youngest did NOT sleep the night until she was 18 months so I know what it's like. How I handled my spending account? I submitted bills every two weeks. My sitter had the receipts ready for me. I was able to fax them in. As the money because available, a check was cut to me. Once the process started, it just more merrily along.

Year two is easier since you are getting money in January from December.