The District of Columbia released final regulations to govern the requirement that employers with 20 or more employees offer commuter transportation benefits to employees. The final regulations provide for penalties that may be assessed against applicable employers that fail to offer at least one of three commuter transportation benefit options.

Program details

The law requires that effective January 1, 2016, District employers of 20 or more employees must offer covered employees one of the following three commuter transportation options:

• Option 1 — Pretax option: Pretax election transportation fringe benefits program that allows employees to set aside pretax income of up to the federal limit ($265 for 2019) to cover the cost of commuting by mass transit or vanpools
• Option 2 — Employer-paid benefit: An employer-paid benefit program whereby the employer offers employees a subsidy of up to the federal limit ($265 for 2019) to offset the monthly cost of commuting
• Option 3 — Employer-provided transit service (vanpool or bus/shuttle operated by or for the employer)

Covered employees include full and part time employees who perform 50% of their work in the District or whose employment is based in the District and a substantial amount of their work is performed in the District with less than 50% or their work performed in any other state.

Employers must provide written notice of the availability of a commuter benefits program. The notice must also provide enrollment information to the employee and information about the person the employee may contact for further information.

New penalties apply for failure to follow the commuter transportation law

The final regulations provide that the failure to offer at least one of the commuter transportation options may result in the following penalties:

• For the first offense, $100
• For the second offense, $200
• For the third offense, $400
• For the fourth and subsequent offenses, $800

The program is administered by the District's Department of Employment Services. See the Department's website for more information. See also the Employer Toolkit on the District's goDCgo website.

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