When using your Pre-tax Forma Card, transactions may be declined for the following reasons:
- Merchant Category Code (MCC)
MCCs are 4-digit codes used to categorize merchants by business type. Sometimes an MCC does not clearly indicate that a product or service is pre-tax eligible. When this happens, the transaction will be declined.
- The purchase is not pre-tax eligible
Refer to this complete list of eligible expenses.
- The account has insufficient funds to cover the entire purchase OR the merchant does not support partial authorization
- The card has been suspended
- The card was reported lost or stolen
- There is an unpaid balance due from an ineligible transaction
- The plan was deactivated
- Employment was terminated
- No pre-tax accounts linked to the card
Confirm you are enrolled in pre-tax benefits with Forma. You can see this by logging in to your Forma account and reviewing your current benefits
- The merchant does not use an inventory information approval system (IIAS)
Some merchants sell a broad range of merchandise, some of which may not be eligible under your FSA plan. Because these merchants sell a variety of products, the IRS requires that supermarkets, discount stores, wholesale clubs, mail order vendors, and web-based vendors implement what’s called an Inventory Approval System (IIAS) to accept FSA cards as payment.
It’s possible that IIAS is in place but not for all cash registers in a store. You can try another terminal, or pay out-of-pocket and file a claim for reimbursement.