your method for saving HSA receipts?

[audreyh1]

Are you stressed a little about the backlog? It would sure bug me to have 30k worth of receipts waiting for me in the future.

Maybe start "paying them off" a few each year so you could begin throwing some away. You could whittle away at the pile over time. Put the cash in your Roth or tax free bonds if you still need the tax free growth.

Not really for us, because I expect to use the HSA to pay (reimburse) Medicare premiums between ages 65 and 70 when we start to draw SS. I'm assuming that will basically drain our HSAs. If not, we'll just continue to reimburse for Medicare until it does, and/or cover current medical expenses such as eye care, dental, etc.

We're in contribution mode right now, and once we can't contribute and get the tax break anymore, we'll start reimbursing current medical expenses.

That's the plan, although I'm still saving receipts "just in case.

 

[45th Birthday]

This is a more pressing matter for those of us who sock money away in an HSA and plan to take it out well down the road, allowing for tax-free appreciation in the meantime.

That is my strategy. I have about $80K in an HSA Bank/TD Ameritrade account. About $58K in contributions, $22K in appreciation.

I've been copying receipts to get them a uniform size and also so that any on odd paper will not fade. They are all in a folder.

This thread makes me realize I need to do something better to insure backup way in the future when I start withdrawing the funds.

A wrinkle that has been in the back of my mind but haven't given much thought to is the rule about not being able to deduct medical expenses you used HSA funds to pay for. What happens if you have deducted medical expenses in some years and not in others? Long into the future, you reimburse for those from the HSA? Also, what about the portion of medical expenses that represents 10% of AGI that cannot be deducted? Can that amount be taken from the HSA?

 

[Fedup]

I'm savings them for implants. I need my teeth in the future. They won't be cheap, I don't need to stress over little receipts.

 

[Montecfo]

We have never pulled money out of HSA. We keep paper receipts and electronic copy of summary EOB's from our insurance providers.

While I have no plan to pull money out anytime soon, most of our medical costs are ahead of us. Even if all my receipts got destroyed, I am pretty sure I will spend the balance and more in the future.

 

[EastWest Gal]

I agree, if you use an HSA account for this kinda stuff, you need records.



If you use it to pay eligible expenses as they occur directly to the providers it's all right there in their records. You pay yourself you better have good records.

The only time we used the HSA was for my son's arm surgery in 2014. There was no easy way to pay the doctor directly. So I paid myself and kept it with a record of what we paid the doctor.

 

[Keim]

I just keep a paper file of receipts that weren't paid by the HSA. Got about $30k worth. Not bad for a 45 year old

When I do reimburse myself for a medical expense I always pay with my cash back credit card, then reimburse myself with the HSA. Every little bit helps!

 

[marko]

My HSA has an online tally of all my expenses. While it doesn't go into deep detail, it will show " $X for Y Pharmacy". Wouldn't a printout of that be enough in the event of an audit?

Regardless, we keep our paper receipts in an annual folder which is then placed with our completed tax forms/returns for each year.

 

[mpeirce]

My HSA has an online tally of all my expenses. While it doesn't go into deep detail, it will show " $X for Y Pharmacy". Wouldn't a printout of that be enough in the event of an audit?

This is what I keep. It shows "normal" health expenses for us like prescriptions and labs and so on. Stuff that makes sense. It also shows what insurance paid, so we don't accidentally include that.

We also pretty much route everything though insurance so that they can pay what they are willing to pay.

And frankly, there is so low a chance of an audit on this stuff I don't worry about it. The last figure I saw was 0.84% of all taxpayers.

 

[someguy]

We are looking for every possible deduction at our high marginal rate, so we're in the camp of maxing the HSA contribution every year but withdrawing/reimbursing nothing. Plan to use it down the road in ER and/or Medicare premiums. Worst case, use it on non-eligible expenses and it gets treated as regular income (at a likely much lower marginal rate).

We scan all the HSA-related receipts and shred the original paper. They are simply stored in a Windows folder structure along with all other receipts -- receipts\2017\HSA Receipts (or receipts\2017\Payee Name for most receipts). The whole thing is backed up to the cloud in real time.