Manage your commuter benefits

Commuter benefit funds can be used on either transit or parking expenses, by swiping your card or using your card number for an online purchase. If purchasing online, the billing address is your home address. 

Remember: the IRS monthly maximum is both a contribution and usage limit. This means you can only contribute up to the limit each month, and you can only spend up to the limit each month.  

Transit

You can use transit funds to commute between your home and primary place of work. 

• Card transaction: you can use your Gusto Benefits Card at any authorized transit vendor, which is a vendor that exclusively sells transit passes.
• Submit a Gusto Benefits card claim: If you had to pay out of pocket for a qualified transit expense, as long as you have an attempted transaction on your Gusto Benefits Card, you can submit a claim. Save your receipt and make sure it includes the date, vendor name, and cost of the service. You can choose to be reimbursed by direct deposit or check.  

Parking

You can use parking funds to park at your primary place of work or at your transit location. 

• Card transaction: You can use your Gusto Benefits Card at any authorized parking lot garage, or meter.
• Submit a Gusto Benefits card claim: If you had to pay out of pocket for a qualified parking expense you can submit a claim (no attempted transaction needed like with transit expenses). Save your receipt and make sure it includes the date, vendor name, and cost of the service. You can choose to be reimbursed by direct deposit or check.  

Commuter benefits help employees pay for qualified commuting expenses with pre-tax money. To have commuter benefits with Gusto, you must have health insurance with Gusto. If you already offer commuter benefits and manage them externally, you can set up deductions for payroll.

Pricing

• $200 annual base fee + $4 per enrolling employee per month ($20 minimum), both covered by the company.
  • An enrolling employee is someone with an active benefit that month. 
• The base fee: if you offer additional tax-advantaged accounts, the base fee only applies once a year. For example, if you offer just commuter benefits, it's $200/year. If you offer commuter benefits as well as an FSA and HSA, the base fee is still $200/year. 

Set up commuter benefits in Gusto 

You can start offering commuter benefits to your team anytime by following these steps:

1. Click on the Benefits tab.
2. Under “Add Benefits” you'll find a Commuter tile. Click Get Started.
3. It’ll ask you if you already offer these benefits. Click No if this is your first time offering commuter benefits.
   • If you would like to transfer an existing commuter benefit to Gusto, go to the Help tab to contact our team. 

Once you’ve finished adding the commuter benefits, we'll email you with the effective date and your employees will be notified to enroll. Unlike most other benefits, your team can enroll in, cancel, or change their commuter benefit elections anytime throughout the year.

Depending on how the policy was set up, full-time, part-time, seasonal, and variable employees can be eligible for commuter benefits. Commuter eligibility is separate from medical eligibility. You can choose to offer commuter benefits to any employment class (including full-time, part-time, variable, and seasonal). 

If you’d like to change your company’s commuter eligibility restrictions, please reach out to our team for assistance.

Who's ineligible?

Owners taking owner’s draws and 2% or greater shareholders of an S Corporation are not eligible to participate in commuter benefits.

Eligible employees can enroll in commuter benefits anytime.

For first-time enrollees, the cutoff to enroll is the 10th of the following month (ex: enroll by July 10th for August benefits). After their initial enrollment, employees have until 2 days before the end of each month to make changes for the following month (ex: make changes by January 30th for February benefits).

1. Sign in to your Gusto employee account.
2. Navigate to the Benefits tab.
3. In the Commuter Benefits box, click on Enroll.
4. Select if you’d like to enroll in transit or parking benefits, or both.
5. Enter how much money you’d like to elect for each month.
   • Important: If your employer offers a contribution, you must elect at least that amount to receive the contribution. For example: say your employer offers up to $100 total, which you can apply to parking and/or transit. To take advantage of the full employer contribution, you would need to elect at least $100 total between parking and/or transit. You could elect $100 to parking and $0 to transit, or $50 to parking and $50 to transit, etc. If you only elect $50 for parking and $0 for transit, you're leaving $50 in employer contributions on the table. If you elect $100 toward parking and $50 toward transit, you'd be deducted $50/month.  
   • The maximum pre-tax contribution for transit contributions in 2022 is $280/month. For 2023, the contribution limit has increased to $300/month.
   • The maximum pre-tax contribution for parking contributions in 2022 is also $280/month. For 2023, the contribution limit has increased to $300/month.
6. Click Confirm and Enroll.

Commuter benefits cards will be sent in the mail before the benefits start.

You can change your commuter benefit elections at any time once your benefit is active. If this is your first enrollment and you've already submitted the amount, please reach out to our team at [email protected] to make the change. 

Changes must be submitted 2 days before the last of a month in order to take effect on the first day of the following month. For example, if you want changes to take effect May 1st, you must submit your change in Gusto by April 28th. 

To make changes:

1. Sign in to your Gusto employee account.
2. Navigate to the Benefits tab.
3. Click the Commuter Benefits tile.
4. Click Change Election.
5. Select if you'd like to enroll in Transit or Parking benefits, or both.
6. Enter how much money you would like to contribute per month towards your commuter benefit.
7. Click Confirm & Enroll.

You can cancel your commuter subscription at any time. If you have a current balance, you will have 90 days after you end the policy to submit claims for services incurred while the policy was active. After the 90 days, any remaining funds will be forfeited to the company and are not reimbursed—even if they were employee-funded.

To avoid forfeiting the funds, reduce the contribution amount instead of canceling the enrollment. This buys you time to use the balance in the account before terminating the policy, without having to put much more money in it.

You'll need to reach out to our team directly to cancel your commuter benefits.

The termination will be at the end of the current month. Here are things to keep in mind:

• Employees have 90 days from the end of the policy to submit claims for services incurred while the policy was active.
• Any unused funds after the 90 days will be forfeited to the company.