Leaderboard

I am not an actuary but I do share several clients and have close working relationships with actuaries. One of the challenges is most companies who have a Defined Benefit Plan or a Cash Balance Plan also have a 401(k) Plan. One strength in all of the relationships is we work together with the actuaries to service the client. A big part of our role is educating the client about the differences between their DB/CB plan and their 401(k) plan. Clients struggle with the notion that a participant with an accrued benefit in a DB/CB plan does not have assets in the trust that essentially are earmarked for an individual participant and the participant cannot direct how the assets underlying the accrued benefits are funded. Clients also struggle with the concept of funding requirements ranging between a minimum and maximum funding level. They also struggle with the concept of a maximum deductible contribution. When working with the actuaries, we welcome their participation in discussions with the clients where we collectively explain the differences between types of plans. One task that we perform for the actuaries is collecting the data they need to do their magic. This includes collecting and validating census data, and confirming that the data the actuary needs to apply the service and compensation data is accurate. We gather and report to the actuaries asset information. We pay special attention to details that the actuary needs such as dates of deposits of contributions and dates of distributions. We will facilitate gathering participant elections concurrently for all plans. While we could say this work that we do is the actuary's job, not ours, we have found that having the client work with a single contact avoids a lot of confusion on the part of the client, payroll and their accountants. Yes, we do get paid for our efforts. To summarize at a higher level, we look at what it takes collectively for us and the actuaries to service the client's plans, we do the tasks that are well within our skill to do, and we defer to the actuaries on those services for which we are not qualified to do.

In lawyers’ and law firms’ lingo, the label “of counsel” has no one settled meaning. It can relate to any of many kinds of relationships. It can, in context, refer to a current partner, a retired partner, an employee, or a nonemployee contractor. Does the of-counsel lawyer provide any service? Even having a lunch conversation with a client’s inside counsel or executive to help keep the client content with the relationship might be a valuable service. Don’t reflexively assume this person is retired. Suggest the plan’s administrator decide whether the participant is or isn’t retired (in the sense Internal Revenue Code § 401(a)(9) uses that word). If the law firm feels unready to interpret § 401(a)(9) and how it applies regarding the facts, you can suggest that the firm might get another lawyer’s advice.