Such plans, also called cafeteria plans, let employees select the benefits they want.

It has also proposed a "cafeteria plan," which offers a variety of benefits, depending on an employee's needs.

Their cost can be deducted and be included in medical coverage under cafeteria plans.

A cafeteria plan allows an employee to pick from a menu of benefits and pay for them with pretax salary dollars.

Qualified cafeteria plans are excluded from gross income.

A Treasury Department survey a few years ago found that 40 million Americans participated in cafeteria plans.

And then they hired a new benefits group, who were great believers in cafeteria plans, and suddenly we had 157 options."

Cafeteria plans are a type of flexible benefit plan that let your employees choose from a list of benefits they wish to participate in.

Grant Thornton found that companies with cafeteria plans were more likely than others to offer expanded health coverage like dental and health-maintenance benefits.

A potential drawback is that the money must be spent "within the coverage period" as defined by the benefits cafeteria plan coverage definition.

This coverage period is usually defined as the "period that you are covered" under the cafeteria plan during the "plan year".

If a cafeteria plan is used, which allows employees to pay for child care with pretax dollars, there are additional benefits to both employer and employee.

Internal Revenue Code Section 125 sets forth the requirements and tax treatment of cafeteria plans.

More sophisticated cafeteria plans offer workers options like life insurance, dependent care and retirement savings, in addition to a variety of health- care plans.

Cafeteria plans.

Unions have historically opposed cafeteria plans, arguing that they ultimately shift costs to workers and distribute costs unevenly.

Cafeteria Plans were added to the Internal Revenue Code in November 1978.

Cafeteria plans allow employees to choose among benefits (like choosing food in a cafeteria), and distributions to pay those expenses are not taxable.

To qualify, a cafeteria plan must allow employees to choose from a selection of two or more benefits consisting of cash or qualified benefit plans.

"If you participate in a cafeteria plan, you may want to choose a benefit other than disability insurance and purchase a disability policy on your own."

A Menu of Benefits Q I've heard "cafeteria plan" used in connection with employee benefits.

Most cafeteria plans offer two different flexible spending accounts; one is for qualified medical expenses and the other is for dependent care expenses.

Effective 1/1/2011, eligible employers meeting contribution requirements and eligibility and participation requirements can establish a "simple" cafeteria plan.

The Internal Revenue Code explicitly excludes deferred compensation plans from qualifying as a cafeteria plan subject to a gross income exemption.

Non-taxable benefits include group health insurance, group life insurance for policies up to $50,000, and certain fringe benefits, including those under a flexible spending or cafeteria plan.