austin3515

Funnily (word??) I just read the DOL's FAQ that you referenced and had the exact same question that you did. I "binged" my question adn came across your post... I laughed out loud a bit. This is the DOL's fault for making this so darn obtuse.

Looking at a 401k plan on Corbel's PPD format, and the only trustee listed is a nondiscretionary trustee. I thought that only a trust company could serve in this capacity. Can a 401k plan have a nondiscretionary trustee as the sole trustee? If so, it seems to me that I would have set all my plans up that way... I looked in the basic plan document and was not able to find anything that explicity prohibited this scenario.

And the size of the Plan of course.

I've seen the fee go from around 10K down to around 8K, give or take. It's not like half the audit is eliminated by any stretch.

the difference between limited/full-scope audits is not that significnat. Frankly it's all the worthless stuff that you get to skip.

In the following article, it appears that the DOL is ignoring the good work that many pension auditors are doing. http://www.bna.com/overreliance-limitedsco...s-n12884909164/

Dat's it!!!!! THANKS!!!

I don't see where 411a11 helps? Also the one I'm referring to had a whole byuch of language about "after a search in accordance with DOL FAB _____, they are unable to be located, an IRA will be opened in the participants name..."

Someone once posted on here a blurb from their plan termination resolution that "Amends" the plan to allow for rollovers for non-responders in the event of plan termination. I tried to find this through the search engines but had no luck. Can anyone post this language or find the post?

But we're increasiong it because of an attained age, so do you agree that this would be OK? (bizaar, but OK?)

FWIW it wouldn't be age discrminiation since the people who are being limited are the younger people. Perhaps you could limit deferrals to $1 for all HCE's, thus alllowing those over 50 to do the catch-ups. The merits of this have been discussed ad nauseum in other posts, in particular how it relates to top-heavy minimums...

"A pooled trustee-directed trust is not the same as a trustee-directed trust where some or all of the participants have individual accounts. There appears to be support for this approach in the statutory construction of Section 105(a)(1)(A)(iii) of ERISA, as discussed at this earlier BenefitsLink thread:" But if the money was in a John Hancock/Great West style platform sending out quarterly statements wouldn't they already be providing the required information?

So if I may summarize, in all cases, SE employees pay more in FICA taxes, correct? I say "all cases" becaise there is no cap on the medicare tax. Even in the "two jobs" example, the owner would get a refund of the overpayment of SS Taxes.

I'm intrigued... Can you please provide an example? I'm not sure I'm following how they're better off.

we're talking just about the match here though?

http://hr.cch.com/news/pension/042312a.asp Take a look at this, from today's BL newsletter. This has always bothered me because it puts SE individuals at a disadvantage from corporations. IF a corporation does a PS contribution for the owner, the PS contribution is not subject to SE Tax. But because the SE's contributions are deducted on page 1 of 1040, they are still included in SE Income. Am I missing something or do others agree that SE Individuals are paying more in payroll taxes (assuming two otherwise identical businesses)?

I agree that it's not silly. As a participant, there is certainly value in knowing at a minimum the breakdown between stocks and bonds, especially if you have, say $100,000 in the plan? I think this gets to ESOP Guys comments about reporting the total by category. Frankly it wouldn't bother me as much if this was the requirement because it is steeped in application and logic.

I agree, I like that answer a lot... By contrast, would it be unreasonable not to prorate his comp?

(b) MODEL STATEMENTS.— (1) IN GENERAL.—The Secretary of Labor shall, within 1 year after the date of the enactment of this section, develop 1 or more model benefit statements that are written in a manner calculated to be understood by the average plan participant and that may be used by plan administrators in complying with the requirements of section 105 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974. What about this though (which Bird mentioned)? We were promised assistance with this and the DOL has not been forthcoming. Are these disclosures being made by the public at large? (FYI, we've been doing this, begrudgingly... I knew we were not the only ones, but I have this nagging suspicion that we're in the minority).

Plan Sponsor adopts a brand new safe harbor plan with an effective date of 1/1/2011. This is a safe harbor match, which is determined/calculated on a per payroll basis. The Plan Sponsor did not actually Adopt the Plan until April 2011 and 401(k) and match did not actually start coming out of employees' paychecks until May 2011. The owner is self employed and will have schedule C of well over $245,000. Being that the payroll for 401k and match did not actually start until May, is there any reason I should have to pro rate the compensation limit even though the effective date is 1/1/2011. Meaning (245,000 / 12) * 8) = 163,333.33. My concern is that the nature of the owner's compensation is such that it unfarily benefits the owner, by allowing him to take into account the entire year of pay, while his employees did not have the same benefit. My concerns would be alleviated if the Plan provided for an annual match, because then everyone would have the advantage of 12 months of pay.

http://benefitslink.com/boards/lofiversion...php/t47953.html Funny, a lot of the same people responded. Bird, because the DOL was supposed to issue some guidance on this and never did, do you still feel the same way you did? Just curious... These pooled plans have a tendency to invest in individual securities which makes the statement requirement a bit onerous - and ridiculous.

I had thought many people concluded that until the DOL came out with some guidance on this ridiculous requirement that we had some lee-way? Come to think of it, I just went through a DOL audit for a pooled plan and this did not even come up...

Tom, are you suggesting this plan has some hope? Or do you agree that the plan has some serious problems. Why do you mention the non-elective aggregation? It doesn't sound like there are nay nonelective contributions?

I find that big well known names are the most likely to have these sorts of problems, especially on smaller plans. In fact, I already know what the TPA's response is going to be. They received a questionnaire in which they asked "Are there any other employers sponsoring plans that are considered part of the same controlled group?" and the client of course said "no." Let me knw if that is indeed the response!

As long as both plans pass coverage you have no problem. If Company B plan excludes the owners, then plan B passes by default because only NHCE's benefit (assuming they were excluded from that plan). Then we get to Company A. Since 100% of all HCE's benefit in the Plan, and just 10% of all NHCE's benefit, even Average Benefits won't help you. So yes, the prior TPA has some explaining to do... I see a VCP submission in your future and some big giant checks in your clients future