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You complete required paperwork for an 8/1 annuity starting date (effective date of payment). Payments can be administratively delayed, which is essentially the time necessary to process the distribution and have the check cut and mailed. Saying it can't be paid until the annual audit is completed is not a reasonable administrative delay. What if you retired 3/1, would they delay payout until October? The audit is for the 2024 plan year and should have no bearing on your payout, unless you are a restricted employee (one of the highest 25 historically paid HCEs). In that case, plan must be 110% funded AFTER your pay out and maybe the audit is required for an accurate value of plan assets - that is the only potential logical reason I could think of.

In my experience, the most common situations where an individually designed plan is used are for: companies that are actively involved in mergers & acquisitions, and the company wishes to preserve certain plan features available to employees of an acquisition; companies that have had plans in place for decades and the company wishes to preserve features that are no longer made available for more recently hired employees; companies that have several classifications of employees and the benefits vary among the classifications. I have not seen a situation where a company uses a pre-approved plan document and the IRS determines that the document has been heavily modified so the document no longer is considered a pre-approved plan document, but this could happen. I have seen some plans that have an excessive number of entries or very long entries in "Describe" lines provided in pre-approved plan Adoption Agreements, or in blank lines available for custom language (particularly in an Appendix), and have wondered if the plan could have crossed the line and become an individually designed plan.

that applies for sole-props as well and many (if not majority) of CPAs think it is OK to deposits VATs by September-ish.

I disagree back. They complete the 1 YOS on the last second of 1/1/2023.

Also, people often miss that the after-tax money has to be deposited within 30 days after the end of the plan year to count for 415 limits.

In my 40+ years, I've probably seen one or two plans that permit non-consecutive years in the FAC definition. Sorry, don't remember any of the details. Is it allowed? Of course. Is it wise? Probably yes for an owner-only plan. Caution don't forget about the 415 definition(s).

Does that document automatically include all employees of employers in the CG or must affiliated employers adopt and, if so, did this one? IF the ONLY issue is missed deferral opportunity I would be inclined to make a 3% QNEC. That's the assumed NHCE ADP in the first year of a prior year ADP tested plan, right? It's also the SHNE rate, which also make 3% the reasonable correction in my mind.

That link you showed looks like a bargain, I'd say start the free trial and see if it lives up to expectations.

The tricky part for ERPA CE is documentation. It sounds like IRS is getting more strict on CE that is not reported to the IRS directly (like ERISAPedia does). I do have some other sources that I recomend for staff or ASPPA CE where you can just self report. Nova does a decent amount of webinars https://nova401k.com/webinars/

I think you have more problems to consider. Was the other company a participating employer? If a solo 401(k) "product" was used then likely not and the document also would have precluded eligibility of any employees. I think you have a demographic coverage failure as well. It's not that they were eligible and not told that they could defer, but I'd bet that under the terms of the plan they weren't even eligible. So not only do you need to fix the missed deferral opportunity - I'd say you have to fix any demographic failure and document deficiencies. You say owner didn't contribute in 2024, but what about other years, when was this a CG, when were there employees? There might be some other solutions here but you need to dig into all the relevant details. If these employees should have been eligible then I do not think zero contribution is an acceptable fix.

Agree completely with Paul I. I also think these are typically larger plan sponsors and is also more prevalent with defined benefit plans that have been around for a long time, older cash balance conversions, and possibly ESOPs that pre-dated their inclusion in pre-approved plans. Most of this could be inertia, and then there is not wanting to continually restate and submit modified pre-approved plans.

if the entry date was immediate (not quarterly) upon satisfaction on the service and eligibility conditions, yes, December 31 makes sense to me.

This discussion most commonly comes up when an employee's service starts a day after an Entry Date. It sometimes helps to consider the how the entry date would be under similar circumstances but applied to a different set of dates. For example, if an employee is hired on January 1st (which is a plan Entry Date) and completes 1000 hours on December 31st (the last day of the first Eligibility Computation Period), would that anyone consider the employee to have entered the plan on December 31st?

and of course, try to avoid having a smaller BOY count the following year compared to the prior year's EOY without something really obvious as to why.

Yes, read the terms of the governing documents and do what they say. That said, I don't know if I have ever seen a document that would cover the death of the trustee in a qualified plan or trust document. I have seen such language in private trusts (e.g., testamentary trust), which would if anything provide that if the trustee is unwilling or unable to serve then someone or the court can appoint the successor. Obviously here you have the right to appoint a successor. I would argue you do not have to remove the old trustee because the old trustee is dead and the morgue or ambulance is responsible for removing the dead, not you (dark humor... sorry). I mean what are you going to do send his estate a removal letter ... that would be in poor taste. That is, because this person was an individual (as opposed to say a corporate trustee) there is no one to remove. That said, I agree with @Below Ground you could do a set of "ratifying/affirming" resos ... just have some language in some document giving the historical references really showing what happened in case someone is every needing to figure it out.

I agree with this. The documents don't usually say "a year and a day of service" they usually mention a year. Looking at a basic plan document for a major provider, it says computation period for purposes of eligibility and regular 1 year of service is "12-month period beginning on the Employee's Employment Commencement Date". The anniversary date option also mentioned in the basic plas document - is described as "12-month period which commences with the Employee's Employment Commencement Date or which commences with the anniversary of the Employee's Employment Commencement Date" If I use @Calavera's reasoning each anniversary date would be both the first date of the computation period as well as the last date of the prior computation period. The specific language will vary by document provider, but double counting a date doesn't make sense to me. That's like saying 1/1 is both the first day of the new plan year and the last day of the prior.

Unless such employees would have to be included for coverage and nondiscrimination because they are not statutorily excluded you do not include for average benefits.

Correct - only works in HCE-only plans or very large plans that can also pass ACP testing because of generous match and excellent NHCE participation. Need to make sure that VAT contributions are tracked separately and get converted before any investment earnings accrue or pick up any such earnings as taxable upon conversion. This can be done via in-plan conversation or withdrawal of the VAT account, just make sure you have provider that can accommodate and all is properly tracked and reported.

I usually explain it by building up with other examples. Abby is hired 12/17/2021, completed one year of service on 12/16/2022, enters 1/1/2023 Bobby is hired on 1/1/2022 has completed one year of service as of 12/31/2022. They enter 1/1/2023. Callie is hired 1/2/2022, has completed one year of service on 1/1/2022, they enter 1/1/2023 since it coincides. Danny has to be 5'2" to ride the coaster, then usually being exactly that height is good enough. They don't have to be more than that height. Emily finished the 8th grade and June 4th was her last day of school. She is done as of that day, she doesn't have to wait until the next day, or the next school year for that so be true.

Yes. Excepted benefit status is relevant for HIPAA portability/ACA market reforms. It's not relevant for the ERISA rules, which require an SMM within 60 days of adoption of a material reduction in group health plan benefits. A material reduction in dental/vision (regardless of excepted benefit status) qualifies for this purpose as a group health plan. More details: https://www.newfront.com/blog/when-to-distribute-an-updated-wrap-spd https://www.newfront.com/blog/aca-and-hipaa-excepted-benefits Cite: https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/CFR-2022-title29-vol9/CFR-2022-title29-vol9-sec2520-104b-3 (d) Special rule for group health plans. (1) General. Except as provided in paragraph (d)(2) of this section, the administrator of a group health plan, as defined in section 733(a)(1) of the Act, shall furnish to each participant covered under the plan a summary, written in a manner calculated to be understood by the average plan participant, of any modification to the plan or change in the information required to be included in the summary plan description, within the meaning of paragraph (a) of this section, that is a material reduction in covered services or benefits not later than 60 days after the date of adoption of the modification or change. Slide summary: Newfront Office Hours Webinar: ERISA for Employers

This expressed opinion is my own, and will not be well-received, especially by those who have been conditioned by misunderstanding and lax attention and enforcement: The entire concept of a discretionary match is intellectually questionable (my real opinion is "bankrupt") and the IRS is remiss by letting the idea get out of hand to the point it is now normalized and difficult to recapture and restore to the original purpose. If you want to make an ad hominem criticism, I will admit that I could never figure out how discretionary matches were legal, let alone sensible. I suffer from sumpsimus in a mumpsimus world.