So the final decision on funding my Health Savings Account (HSA) is that I will have to do transfers to the account from my ING account on my own because the payroll department refuses to add in a pre-tax deduction. This means that I will be contributing to the account on an after tax basis but I can claim the contributions on my taxes every year.

I really think that the payroll lady (yes the person in charge) needs to be educated on making pre-tax deductions because she seems to think that just because our employer does not offer the HSA then the deduction cannot be done. I think it is the same thing as when I had the Flexible Spending Account (FSA) in that it is a matter of coding it. I requested that they deduct $X from my account on a pre-tax basis and provided the FSA account number and routing number. She codes it and every month the money came out of my check. The HSA is the same thing, I have an account number and a routing number and it is a legal pre-tax deduction so just go ahead and code it and let it come out of my salary.

However, the employer managed the FSA and since they do not manage the HSA I think that she is just ignorant of the facts surrounding a legal deduction…so she really needs to be educated. I am not going to fight her because she is the only person who can do it (we have a very small payroll department, maybe 3 people and she is the head) and she just will not work with me.