Financial Management Service (FMS)
What is a Financial Management Service (FMS)?
The only service participants in the Self-Determination Program (SDP) must use is a Financial Management Service (FMS). This service is required to be vendored with your regional center. Not all FMSs work with all regional centers. You can look here to see what FMS your regional center works with:
The FMS handles all payments for your spending plan’s services, items, and activities. Specifically, the FMS will:
- Pay the bills for your services, activities, and items. Each FMS may have a different payment process, so learning the specifics in advance is important.
- Provide a monthly statement showing how you are spending your budget to help ensure you have enough funds for the entire year.
- Handle employer taxes for your staff and ensure all employment laws are followed.
To receive captions in Spanish, Korean or other languages, turn on Closed Captioning (CC) and then click Settings > Subtitles/CC > Autotranslate to select your language.
The Three Model Types:
The Financial Management Service (FMS) can offer three models of services for you. Not all FMSs offer all three types. Each model offers different kinds of help. You need to pick the one that is best for you. Here’s what they do:
1. Bill Payer:
You don’t hire any workers yourself. You only buy services or activities from agencies and organizations and purchase items.
2. Co-Employer:
The FMS acts as the official employer of your workers. They can reject a person that you want to hire. Co-employer does not mean that the FMS will help you find employees or manage their schedules. The FMS handles workers’ comp insurance and pays the taxes. The employees that they hire for you will follow the FMS employee benefits such as health insurance and vacation time. Most of the FMS requires that all employees have background checks. They can limit if employees can work for multiple SDP participants.
3. Sole Employer:
You are the employer of record. The FMS will do the payroll, taxes, and background checks. Depending on the FMS, you may handle the workers’ comp insurance or use the FMS plan. You will find your employees and manage their schedules. You have the most control over who you hire and how you manage them. You can decide what benefits you want to offer your employees.
To receive video captions in Spanish, Korean or other languages, click on the YouTube logo on the bottom right, turn on Closed Captioning (CC) and then click Settings > Subtitles/CC > Autotranslate to select your language.
Find your Financial Management Service (FMS)
Finding the right FMS for your needs will make your SDP run smoothly. It is better to wait for the right one than to select one because they have immediate availability. You can always change your FMS but it does take additional work and is easiest to do at your annual renewal.
Your independent facilitator can provide you with information to help you decide. You should interview the FMS to decide if they will meet your needs.
Here are some questions you might want to ask:
Here is a detailed list of FMS providers: