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Thanks, @Effen -- that was a fun thing to wake up to on a Saturday. 😲 We did manage to stop them mid-stream, and have added a few more safeguards. Staying one step ahead is a challenge sometimes!

From what I hear we are expecting final regs, not another delay. I don't see it on the OMB Dashboard yet, so it may be a December surprise.

Peter, there is no limit to what a participant may perceive.

A big thank you to Lois and the entire IT team (is that just Lois?) for cleaning up the site after the major spam attack over the weekend. Every board was littered with messages. These boards are very useful to many people and it doesn't happen without great support. Thank you to the entire clean up crew.

This is exactly why plans should follow the actual law rather than the shallow, ill-informed, Department of Labor suggestion for the plan not to follow the law (to take action only upon receipt of a domestic relations order) and instead follow some some wispy notion or information that maybe there will be a domestic relations order someday or maybe there won’t, and thus the plan should interfere with plan terms and legal provisions otherwise clearly applicable.

I think the location of the assets is 100% irrelevant.

Do your QDRO procedures state anything about freezing accounts and, if so, under what circumstances? If they don't say anything or if they do but don't cover this situation, then you don't have any authority to freeze the accounts. If worried, I agree with the sending a letter approach...maybe send a letter to both spouse's stating something like... We have been informed that a divorce is impending and that QDROs may be being prepared in connection with the divorce. Your accounts will be frozen of [14] days unless a QDRO is submitted (or letters from your attorneys stating a QDRO will be submitted) by such date. If we do not receive a QDRO (or letter from you attorneys) on or before the end of this [14-] day period, the accounts will be unfrozen and each participant will be permitted to take loans and/or distributions as permitted under the terms of the plan. I am sure you can be more artful. At least this way you only put a short freeze on the account, which sounds like what you want to do, and most of all it should not put any extreme undue hardship on the participants. Just practical thoughts...

Amen Brother Bill!

Also wondering if they have heard about making donations to not for profits from IRAs to eliminate RMDs. I get questions every year about doing that from the retirement plan.

Going back to the original question, the daughter could be a designated beneficiary if she is the beneficiary due to a default in the plan document. If the default is the estate then she is not a designated beneficiary, even if she is the sole heir. If the default is to the kids and then she is a designated beneficiary. And so would any of her siblings. The regulations only require that the beneficiary be identifiable by the plan - and be an individual or determinable through a look-through trust. There is no look-through rule for an estate.

Check the plan document usually but not always there is language that addresses short plan years and what happens with accruals, if you have an adoption agreement/master text its probably in the master text somewhere. If if is individually designed I'm not sure where it would be. If you are deviating from existing plan terms, address it in the amendment but I don't see why it couldn't be addressed in either a single amendment or a series of amendments. If you are not giving at least a pro-rated accrual credit for the short plan year I'd assume you would want a 204(h) notice addressing the short year and I'd assume you'd have to pass 401(a)(26) on an accrued to date basis.

Why? What is your relationship to the plan? To the parties? Do you know whether the divorcing parties expect to include any particular assets (in this case, the 401k accounts) in their asset division? Even if you do know, is it any of your concern? Is it possible the parties will find ways to simplify asset division by ignoring some? Is it possible both accounts are small enough so as to be trivial? (BTW, these questions might be inter-related.) I'm not really asking you for answers, just pointing out that the plan (and its administrators) should stay out of the legal proceeding. It seems likely the QDRO procedures direct you to act on a (draft) DRO only if you get one. Alternatively, if your QDRO procedures direct you (or someone) to speak up (or take any specific action) whenever you hear about a potential divorce of a plan participant, then you should quickly engage an ERISA attorney to help you correct that.

This is addressed in Rev Proc 2021-30 under the "missed deferral opportunity"/"failure to implement an employee election". The employer must fund the total match the employee would have received had the correct deferral election been applied timely. In other words, if the employee elected to defer 6%, the match is based on a 6% deferral election, not the QNEC amount for the missed deferral.

The plan document should specify the beneficiary if there is no designated beneficiary. The plan document must be followed. So, no to your question. If the plan provides that, in the absence of a designated beneficiary, the eldest child of the participant is the beneficiary, and said daughter is the only child of the participant, then the daughter is the beneficiary, but not a designated beneficiary. I doubt that the plan provides that the eldest child of the participant as the default beneficiary. The plan might provide that the children of the participant are beneficiaries, and equal shares. The plan might provide that the estate of the participant is the beneficiary. If the daughter is the administrator of the estate, then the daughter will manage the plan benefit.

I agree with David but good merger amendments/resolutions will specify that the assets in the old plan are part of the surviving plan as of the merger date.