How to use a PFA

Eligible Expenses

The IRS has rules that designate which products and services are considered qualified medical expenses that can be purchased with funds from personal funding accounts. You can use your PFA funds to pay for hundreds of IRS-approved health expenses, as well as certain health plan deductibles and coinsurance. The IRS also provides information on what supplementary documentation you may need to provide for your expenses or retain in case of an audit. Please refer to our What is Substantiation? section for more information on documentation.

It’s important to understand exactly what qualifies as an eligible expense to ensure you’re using your PFA correctly. Using funds from your PFA to pay for unqualified expenses may result in the loss of access to your payment card and require repayment.

HSA and FSA eligible expenses

Here are some examples of common eligible HSA and FSA expenses:

Medical expenses for provider visits, diagnostic and preventive care, hospital services, medical equipment, and more
Dental expenses
Vision expenses
Prescription/pharmacy expenses

HRA Eligible Expenses

Eligible expenses for HRAs are customizable and vary depending on the specifications of your group's health plan. For full details on what's considered an eligible expense for your HRA, please refer to your employer’s benefit booklet.

Manage your PFA with the mobile app

If you received your PFA as part of your Premera health plan, download this mobile app to manage your HSA, FSA, or HRA. With the mobile app, you’ll be able to manage the following all in one place:

Track your balance, recent transactions, and contribution limits
Capture and submit receipts and add receipts to specific expenses
Pay bills, track payments, and get reimbursements
Search for qualified medical expenses
Make a HSA contribution through mobile check deposit or bank transfer
Get a quick account snapshot any time and sign in using fingerprint recognition
Manage investments

Using your PFA funds

There are two ways you can use your PFA funds to pay for eligible expenses:

Use a healthcare payment card where credit/debit cards are accepted.

If you were issued a healthcare payment card as part of your PFA, you can use it at retail settings (such as pharmacies, grocery stores, or a provider’s office) the same way you would use a standard payment card.
Note: If asked by your provider to pay up front (before a claim has been processed by your health plan), you can use your healthcare payment card. However, you may need to repay any overcharges if the amount you owe is less than the amount charged up front by your provider. Keep all documentation as it may be required to validate claims.

Pay with your own money and submit an online claim with your receipt to receive reimbursement.

Please keep documentation to ensure the amount paid matches the amount your explanation of benefits (EOB) shows if/when your health plan has processed the claim.
Use the member portal to submit your claim and provide documentation when you pay for eligible expenses out of pocket.

Documentation required for FSAs and HRAs

When submitting claims for reimbursement, you’ll need to provide supporting documentation to validate your claim to receive reimbursement. Itemized receipts are the most common form of documentation used when submitting a claim, but you’ll need to ensure that all receipts or documentation you submit contain the following required information:

Name of the person who incurred the service or expense
Name and address of the provider or merchant
Date the service or expense was incurred
Detailed description of the service or expense
The remaining cost after any applicable health plan payments have been made

For more information on documentation, refer to our What is Substantiation? section.