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Depending upon your plan design, you might well satisfy ADP via the safe harbor, yet STILL need ACP testing if there are matching contributions that don't satisfy the ACP safe harbor. The testing for the Profit Sharing, again, will depend upon your profit sharing formula, and whether you utilize a "design based safe harbor" under the 401(a)(4) regulations, or whether you are general testing, etc. Also, there's no automatic top heavy exemption, even in a 401(k) safe harbor, if you are making profit sharing contributions or reallocating forfeitures. So be careful on this. Your 401(k) safe harbor contributions can be used toward top-heavy, but may not be sufficient if you are allocating safe harbor based on compensation from date of participation. There are enough possible "hooks" or complications, depending upon the specific plan design and employee census, so that using general answers from this board is risky business. If I were you, I'd discuss with co-workers/supervisors/etc. to get some clear direction/instruction, and consider sources such as the Erisa Outline Book, for example to give you a better understanding of these issues.

Mr. Dragon, You need to visit with your mentor/supervisor/trainer. You need some pension 101 gaps filled in. If a plan is truly abiding by the safe harbor rules, there will not be an ADP/ACP test. (I am assuming no dual eligibility) If you add a ProRata profit sharing into the equation, you will still not do an ADP/ACP test. (still assuming no dual eligibility) You just need to pass 401(a) coverage testing. New comparability/Cross Testing is a completely different animal when it comes to what tests need to be run. Volumes are written about cross testing..... there is really no short cut to knowledge about these plans. Good luck.

EZs are not published on EFAST, even when filed electronically.

Well, theoretically (or maybe practically) speaking, an employer might not want to match these higher catch-up contributions, either for financial reasons or considering it "unfair" to younger catch-up eligible employees, or both. Possibly other reasons I haven't considered. I'm feeling particularly antiquated myself these days, so I need some reprogramming. Our son was discussing a new "smart" TV with us the other day which I'm not smart enough to understand, and I informed him that he was (A) going to go to the store with me to tell me what I should buy, and (B) he was going to set it all up for us at our house. With what it costs to raise your kids, there needs to be SOME small return on the investment...

Look at the investment statements. It's easy enough to see if the money came out or not. If the company is paying the premium (which I oppose), the best you could do is figure out how to treat that as contributions to the plan. If the only money in the plan is rollover money, then the insurance premium exceeded the incidental limits immediately and the entire premium each year is a taxable distribution. It's treated just like an in-service distribution. Rollover money doesn't count in the incidental calculations. How did the rollover money not exceed $250k? The premiums paid into the policy will have expenses and cost of insurance. Frankly, you've got a mess and people that only know parts of the rules sold this and set it up. You're best bet is to get ERISA counsel involved and see what can be salvaged. What you use as the beginning balance (and it's whatever the value was on 1/1/22) is the very least of the issues here.

Use the previous year balance and check the box that this is the initial filing.

Just curious, if the plan’s administrator (we presume it directs the bank trustee for distributions) considers any risk: What information did the plan’s administrator use to decide that the participant had no more than those six children?

I see Mr. Bagwell and I were typing responses at the same time!

Hello Luke Bailey -- Just wanted to mention that we got some guidance on SCP for terminated plans in Q&A 2 of IRS Notice 2023-43: Q-2. Before Rev. Proc. 2021-30 is updated pursuant to section 305(g) of the SECURE 2.0 Act, are there any Eligible Inadvertent Failures that a plan sponsor may not self-correct? A-2. Yes. Before Rev. Proc. 2021-30 is updated pursuant to section 305(g) of the SECURE 2.0 Act, a plan sponsor may not self-correct the following Eligible Inadvertent Failures: . . . (3) A significant failure (that is, a failure that is not an insignificant failure, as determined in accordance with the factors set forth in section 8.02 of Rev. Proc. 2021-30) in a terminated plan. . . .

One imagines the administrator of a multiemployer pension plan is the plan’s joint board of trustees. If you’re a nondiscretionary service provider, perhaps you want whatever instruction that fiduciary gives you, which might include a stop instruction. Consider that the trustees might instruct that all communications are from or to their counsel, to help preserve (as much as is possible, even recognizing the fiduciary exception) evidence-law privileges for lawyer-client communications made to help the lawyers form their advice or render their advice. If the plan’s administrator acted innocently and prudently in relying on the participant’s false statement, ERISA § 205(c)(6) might afford some relief. “If a plan fiduciary acts in accordance with part 4 of this subtitle [ERISA’s fiduciary-responsibility provisions] in . . . (B) making a determination under paragraph (2) [for example, about whether a consent was excused “because there is no spouse”], then such . . . determination shall be treated as valid for purposes of discharging the plan from liability to the extent of payments made pursuant to such Act [sic].” ERISA § 205(c)(6), 29 U.S.C. § 1055(c)(6) (emphasis added) http://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=(title:29%20section:1055%20edition:prelim)%20OR%20(granuleid:USC-prelim-title29-section1055)&f=treesort&edition=prelim&num=0&jumpTo=true At least one court construed the “to the extent” phrase to mean that a plan must pay the surviving spouse an amount or amounts based on what remains of the benefit that would have been provided in the absence of the participant’s false election after subtracting the amounts the plan paid. Hearn v. Western Conference of Teamsters Pension Trust Fund, 68 F.3d 301 (9th Cir. 1995).

Even if one might find and get some records from CWM or a receiver, your client might consider whether it wants CWM’s records. Consider that those records might have little, no, or even adverse value. The linked-to news reporting suggests CWM might have been used for some frauds. How likely is it that your client would discern which of CWM’s records are true and correct, and which are false or incorrect? If it helps any, this hyperlink is to the Securities and Exchange Commission order that bars Mr. Couture from association with any securities-related business. https://www.sec.gov/files/litigation/admin/2022/34-96392.pdf With other information, the order shows the District of Massachusetts’ docket number for United States v. James Kenneth Couture—No. 21-cr-10172-NMG (D. Mass.).