Pay yourself back with Starship

Health savings accounts (HSAs) are cool for a lot of reasons. But one of our favorites is that they can help put money back in your pocket in more ways than one. Here’s what paying yourself back looks like with Starship.

What does it mean to pay yourself back? 

You can pay for eligible health expenses using your Starship health savings account (HSA) in one of two ways: either by using your Starship card, or paying with a debit or credit card and then reimbursing yourself later (AKA paying yourself back). 

TL;DR: When you pay yourself back, you’re sending money from your health savings account (HSA) to your linked checking or savings account.

So why use ‘pay yourself back’?

Sometimes, you don’t have your Starship card handy when making a health purchase, so you use your debit or credit card instead. We get that! ‘Pay yourself back’ exists to help you get funds back into your everyday spending account when you need them.

‘Pay yourself back’ is also great when you don’t have enough money in your HSA at the time of purchase, but save up enough in your account overtime to cover the expense. As long as your HSA was opened prior to incurring the expense, you’re golden.

Bonus! Reimbursements for HSA-eligible expenses, are a tax-free distribution and don’t incur any penalty fee.

How to pay yourself back

Simply log in to the Starship app, tap the + sign, then tap ‘pay yourself back’, and follow the steps. You’ll have the funds in your linked bank in 1-5 business days.

While making a reimbursement, you also have the ability to capture the details of the associated purchase—like adding a receipt, merchant, and purchase date—all ‘optional’ details to help you keep track of things. 

We highly suggest keeping a record of your HSA purchases and reimbursements just in case you ever get audited by the IRS. They could ask for proof of (HSA-eligible) purchases… and you don’t want to get hit with a 20% penalty, or any applicable income taxes for distributions!

Luckily, the Starship app makes keeping track of your HSA activity simple. Use it to spend, save, invest, and even… pay yourself back!