Information on the Bailout Bonus for Cycle Commuters

[kfergos]

I'm sure this has been mentioned here before, but I wanted to provide details that seemed to be lacking. With one of the economic bailouts, cycle commuters are eligible to receive $20 a month for bike maintenance and so forth from their employers; the employers benefit by having this be a tax write-off. The League of American cyclists has a helpful explanation (http://www.bikeleague.org/news/100708faq.php).

For Massachusetts bike commuters, check the MassBike web site (http://www.massbike.org/news/bikecommuterbenefit.htm). A guy who's an "employee benefits professional" has volunteered to help explain stuff and help you get your work on board.

[Biciclista]

Yes my employer is going to do it too.

[fidlfreek]

WOW this is awesome. I'm concerned though. It seems that you cannot get the benefit if you are provided with a car parking place at work. Hrm.

Any ideas?

[PscyclePath]

That's correct... the way the benefit was passed as part of the recovery bill, you can only claim one of the various benefits, for parking, for public transit ($120), or for bicycling ($20).

The week before last, Representative Blumenauer filed the Intermodal Commuter Benefit Act (HR 863) that would allow you to claim more than one of the benefits, sort of a clean-up bill for the recovery act.

Tom