Dental Insurance

[bzorc]

A Section 125 plan is designed to reimburse a participant up to $400 of qualified dental services.

A participant is asking whether they can purchase an individual dental insurance policy, and be reimbursed the $400 that the employer offers towards the cost of the policy.

I think the answer is no, but I am not sure. Any replies would be appreciated.

Thanks.

[Guest matthew222]

i'm pretty sure you can set up a section 125 plan, or at least an HRA, to allow for this. prior to the ACA banning the reimbursement of individual *medical* plan premiums by employers, custom built section 125 plans (i.e. not boilerplate) could be set up so that employees could pay for these plans on a pre-tax basis. since the ACA doesn't govern dental plans, i don't see why you couldn't follow the same strategy in this case.

with that said, should the employer take time out of his schedule to amend his plan and possibly pay a fee for doing so to cater to this one employee? i would not, but that's just my 2¢.

if you want to move forward down this path, i would recommend reaching out to a section 125 administrator to determine costs and next steps.

[QDROphile]

A section 125 plan can be set up to provide for payment of dental insurance premiums, but an FSA cannot be used to pay or reimburse the premiums and "reimburse a participant up to $400" sounds more like an FSA to me.