Increased use of Commute Options by your employees could benefit your company by:
• Alleviating parking shortages
• Boosting employee recruitment
• Strengthening employee morale and retention
• Helping the company "go green"
• Saving your company some money
Employer Savings: What if you could add a benefit for your employees and save the company money at the same time?
Ever hear of Commuter Choice? As defined by the Federal Transit Administration: Commuter Choice is a provision of the Internal Revenue Code [(26 USC 132(f)] that permits an employer to pay for an employee's cost of commuting to work, in other than a single occupancy vehicle.
Commuter Choice currently allows employers to offer their employees a tax free fringe benefit of up to $245 per month if they ride transit or a vanpool to get to work. The program is designed to improve air quality, reduce traffic congestion, and conserve energy by encouraging employees to commute by means other than single occupancy motor vehicles.
Like you, most employers today are faced with the spiraling costs of doing business, and yet still want to provide incentives to keep valued employees. Commuter Choice could be a way to save the company some money and reward your employees at the same time.
Calculate the benefits for your company!
The Best Workplaces for CommutersSM provides a comprehensive summary of commuter benefits and additional resources like a step-by-step "how to" guide for employers establishing carpool incentive programs, a comprehensive briefing paper that describes the qualified transportation fringe benefits covered under a tax-free and pretax provision of the federal tax code, information on parking cash-out, telework and vanpool programs, and more.
Commute Info also provides some Commute Cost Calculator tools to help you understand the costs of driving alone to work based on roundtrip distance of your commuter, the number of days you travel, and the cost of parking and tolls. They also offer a Gas Price Calculator tool to quickly understand the split gas costs when traveling in a 2- or 4-person carpool, 12-person vanpool, or riding transit.
