The pandemic has made it trickier to calculate how much to contribute next year to any flexible spending accounts your employer offers.
Health-care FSAs enable a worker to use up to $2,750 of pretax dollars to cover unreimbursed medical expenses such as eyeglasses or medication copays.
Dependent-care accounts allow individuals or a married couple filing jointly to use as much as $5,000 of pretax earnings to pay for programs such as day care and summer camp for children under age 13.
Financial advisers often recommend contributing to these accounts, since they can save on taxes—especially for higher earners.
But Covid-19 called a halt earlier this year to many day-care centers and summer camps as well as nonessential medical procedures. That has some advisers rethinking contributions to FSAs partly because the money you contribute could be lost if you don’t use it.
