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I wouldn't typically terminate a plan before the end of the year if the company wanted to make a contribution for that year, or else, as Bill Presson notes, you do something to waive last day requirements or whatever. Depends on what you want to happen I guess. mutatis mutandis to you too.

I did see an attorney do it that way. Personally I think this is short sighted because a) the verbal gymnastics involved in adding that provision will be signficant (loss of reliance on pre-approval?). And what if they leave you? Will their new provider understand what you were doing? Take over your language correctly? I just really think it's going to be a lot more isolated than you think. Maybe if you had a significant outlier plan or something, keep that in your back pocket. But if you amend "hundreds" of plans this way, long-term someone else messes that up. I'd peronally hate to have a long-term complication to solve a short-term problem. I've thhought aboutt his the same as you for a long time. That's where I landed, obviously it's a gut call!

Last time I checked, 500 was less than 1000, and 500 hours in 12 months is roughly equivalent to 10 hours a week. If you don't have anyone in the 500-1000 group, then why bother? I can't say I paid too much attention to the details so I'm probably missing something...

Let’s leave to actuaries what mūtātīs mūtandīs might mean in mathematics. And let’s leave to teachers what mutatis mutandis might mean in logic. Black’s Law Dictionary (11th ed. 2019) describes the phrase’s meaning as “with the necessary changes[.]” Lawyers have used the phrase to avoid some duplicative renderings of terms, promises, conditions, representations, and warranties in some kinds of contracts, obligations, or undertakings. A leading treatise about how to write contracts gives this example: “Each Guarantor hereby makes to the Lender, as if they were in this agreement, mutatis mutandis, each of the statements of fact made by the Borrower in the Loan Agreement.” Kenneth A. Adams, A Manual of Style for Contract Drafting ¶ 13.576 [page 449] (5th ed. 2023). But whatever the old phrase might mean in other contexts, one should not presume that specifying a date that has some meaning regarding a plan’s discontinuance or termination by itself changes a day set for a retirement plan’s allocation condition. Bill Presson leads us to the solution: Read, thoroughly and carefully, what the documents governing the plan say. If what the documents provide is ambiguous, the plan’s administrator might use its discretion to interpret what the plan provides or omits. Often better, the administrator might suggest that the plan sponsor amend the documents. Or does The Shadow know?

Yes you do. But that’s a one time search and most clients doing this are smaller. And if tracking vesting years based on 1,000 hours your limited to people who have zero vesting years. but the large non-top heavy plans we almost exclusively switched 401k eligibility to some short elapsed time (or they were there already). There will be some research but expect it to be limited. this one time project is a small price to pay to avoid LTPT rules…

Certainly an operational defect (OD) and it has been corrected. Not all ODs give rise to a prohibited transaction (PT). To the extent you have deferrals deposited late you have a PT - but your correction was an ER contribution, there were no salary deferrals withheld for which the employer had prohibited use that would create a PT, in my opinion, so I think you are OK on that front.

And even if the multiple-employer plan’s governing documents might allow a participating employer to specify less than 100% vesting for what happened before a merger or transfer-in, how confident are you that the MEP’s administrator will capably collect and use records to apply such a vesting provision?