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Wait a minute, here! Is the spouse still alive? If not, are the children? If not, did they have any children who remain alive? You need to have no answers to all of the preceding questions before you even consider whether the benefit is payable to the participant's estate. The points raised by ESOP Guy are all problems for the decedent's estate and the surviving heirs. If it is payable to an estate, have the executor/administrator certify the EIN for the estate before you pay anything. Also ask to see letters testamentary (if the decedent died with a will) or letters of administration if the decedent did not have a will in force at the time of death. For the last sentence, short forms are ok for the plan to accept in lieu of full letters testamentary/administration. If the estate is too small, there is an affidavit that is filed with the probate court -- have the personal representative provide you with a certified copy of the de minimis estate order. When it is time to issue the 1099-R, you would issue it to the estate's EIN (or if the estate is too small to the persons's SSN name in the order in lieu of administration). Who gets it, in what proportions and all other questions are not issues for the plan to solve -- they are the problems to be faced by the executor/administrator. I know that determining who gets per stirpes can be an issue since the plan would not know who is eligible to inherit. In that case, have the executor/administrator provide that to you. You might also want to get a release that you have a right to rely upon what they are telling you and that you have no liability for making payments pursuant to their direction.

Read the plan document. It should describe what should happen in this situation. Refer it to ERISA counsel. Typically the document says the benefit will be paid "per stirpes", then to the estate.

Nope. Roth is either allowed or it isn't, you cant limit it to catch up.

You will need to understand exactly what is meant, or intended, by the "such other heirs" phrase. While (probably) rare, it could be open-ended.

Yes, as I recall, (assuming you distribute by April 15th) the entire excess of $2,000 is reported for 2022. Then the distribution, which will be less than 2,000 due to losses, is reported for 2023 and the participant shows a loss on 2023 tax return. I believe there is an "other income" line on the 1040 where this would show the loss. But don't trust my memory...I don't!

It sounds like you need to confirm (with backup documentation) exactly what was done and when it was done. Was the soloK actually terminated? Were there common law employees in the other company eligible for the soloK at any time in the existence of the plan? Does the other company still exist? Were the soloK plan eligibility provisions drafted in a way that would extend eligibility to the current company employees? What did the owner think was the distributable event that allowed for a rollover? ... There may be a problem because of the successor plan rule. There may be a problem because there is a controlled group. There may be a problem because there are eligible employees who are due benefits. There may be a problem because there are missed deferral opportunities (assuming these are 401(k)s)... In almost all of these scenarios, consider involving an ERISA attorney at least to review all of the facts and proposed remedial actions. This is the kind of surprise with a new client that we all dread. Stick to the facts and follow them to where they lead, and consider asking the questions about other plans to your due diligence process for accepting new clients. Good luck!

Hire ERISA counsel to guide the process and keep them on track for the future.

Another point worth noting is that all qualified plans are subject to a $5,000 (increasing to $7,000 per SECURE 2.0) participant consent requirement, regardless of whether spousal consent to the selection of an alternate form of benefit is required by the plan document, ERISA or the Code.

As long as you use Line 34 of Sch F you will be ok. Cattle that is purchased and later sold is reported on Form 4797 and not subject to SE. Since farming is a capital intensive business, it is important to coordinate with the CPA or you will do all of the work to later learn he has a loss from depreciation deductions.

Here is a link to several posts from a few years ago discussing splitting a plan to avoid an audit: Splitting Plans to avoid audit It includes comments from those who have done this. Note that all of the comments focus on how to split the plan prospectively including steps to take to mitigate possible challenges to the process. There are several comments about the DOL and IRS perspective on how to count participants as of the beginning of the year. Basically, they will look at facts on the first day of the plan year and a plan cannot alter those facts. My take is the plan will not succeed in trying to alter, with a retroactive amendment, the participant counts as they stood on 1/1/2022. It will be interesting to see if anyone has had any more recent experience on the topic.

In this case, for the 11(g) amendment we get to decide who will be allowed to get covered and be considered benefiting for coverage. We know each individual's service history and compensation, and the consequences if we extend coverage to include each of them. We then expand the existing ACP test population to model the inclusion of a prospective selection of individuals for coverage on the ACP test. Using this population, we model ACP testing strategies to optimize the outcome. (Depending on the plan sponsor, optimizing may be purely cost or may include some consideration on who gets included and who does not.) Once we have modeled a desired result, write and adopt the 11(g) amendment. The amendment is predetermined to result in passing coverage and curing the ACP. Short version, when we can control all of the variables, we can predict the outcome. If you try this with canned testing software, it can be terribly inefficient. Excel can be used to build the model then use its data management features and what-if analytical capabilities to find a solution.