alexa

Good morning, I haven't worked on plans part of a master trust(MT) for awhile 2 DC plans 001 & 333 are part of MT No audit was done for MT but Form 5500 filed Instead, each plan filed their own detailed Sch H with audit reports and auditor mentioned in 2022 audit notes about the plans being part of MT Is this ok? In the past, I have filed the audit with MT Form 5500 and the plans would just list their $ in MT on Sch H. I'm also questioning the use of plan #333? this is a union 401(k) plan- no other employers Much thanks, Lexy

GM- We have folks who move from regular benefits eligible jobs to non-benefits eligible jobs during the year. 401k plan compensation is W-2 wages +401(k) deferral less fringe benefits. Plan counts all comp not just comp from entry. Question: Payroll has been sending wages every 2 weeks to our 401k provider including wages when the employee is in a non-benefits eligible position. Do we count this non-eligible status pay for plan compensation? If you have a code section that addresses this please provide. Much thanks! Lexy

But we have been excluding these direct sellers based on Pub 15A, similar to exclusion of real estate agents. However, it is my understanding that these direct sellers' income is reported on W-2 with all taxes being withheld by us including federal income tax, etc.. Can if we exclude them if they are getting a W-2 vs a Form 1099? Thank you.

We have direct seller who get a W-2 from us; the majority pf what they do for most is 100% direct sales. They are excluded from H&W & 401k benefit plans. Must these direct sellers be counted in ACA testing? thnaks Alexa

HI Luke A little late replying we had an erisa plan which I filed late filings through the DFVCP process; luckily capped at $4k:) Alexa

Thanks Brian for your help. We are not terminating the employee's benefits since he is working >20 hours/week and he is able to keep some LTD $ as long as combined co wages + LTD benefit < 100% of pre-disability pay And he does not have medical with us just the Health FSA, vision and life.

Thanks Brian I had thought the employee was going to drop down to the 16 hours/week but he has decided to do closer to 30 hours/week. He is only 30. If he had gone down to 16 hours he would have been benefits ineligible and been able to change his health FSA to 0 deduction correct? I am reading that it is trickier to change health HSA

We have an employee who just got approved for LTD after 6 months. He has been working part-time (about 20 hours/week) after his STD expired 6 months ago He has decided to continue to work part-time. Our benefits eligibility is 20 hours/week He currently has a health FSA. Our policy has been to terminate all benefits with exception of continuing medical and employer paid basic life at 1x pay and offering COBRA for dental & vision one someone gets approved for LTD. This is the first LTD who has returned to work Can we terminate his health FSA or other benefits since still actively employed and benefits eligible? Is LTD status a "change in status" event? if so what benefits can be changed? Our fully insured carrier has a Return to Work Incentive of up to 12 months as long as monthly earnings from job+ LTD benefit not more than 100% of predisability pay For him to get full LTD he will need to reduce his hours to no more than 16 hours/week which makes him ineligible for benefits To make things more interesting we are no longer going to terminate anyone on an LTD status so not sure yet how that affects the equation:) Thanks in advance for any help Lexy

HI All and Happy New Year! We have posted the new Surprise Billing Model Notice to the benefits section of our Company intranet along with all of our other H&W compliance Notices and recently provided a link to the Notice to all US employees. Would this satisfy the “publicly available” requirement? Much thanks! Lexy

Hi All, We have a handful of ex-pats (US citizens working abroad) where we offer an international plan for medical, dental and vision benefits. At Open enrollment for US we offer them the option of healthcare and dependent care accounts along with voluntary life and voluntary LTD. We have recently implemented other voluntary benefits(pet, legal, ID theft & auto/home) but carriers indicated residence must be US based so have not offered to the ex-pats Are there any things to look out for in offering the FSA accounts? Much thanks in advance! Kind regards, Lexy

Much thanks! actually parent's plan year is same as ours so our employee has decided to enroll in our plan effective 1/1/2022 at Open enrollment starting 11/1/2022

Hi All, Our employee came to me, indicating her parents are going through open enrollment effective for changes 11/1/2021. Our employee (under age 26) is under her parents plan currently. Her parents are considering dropping her since she can get medical though us. Our open enrollment starts in Nov effective 1/1/2022 Can we allow her to add medical due to losing coverage under her parents plan effective 11/1/2021? She will not be be 26 until next Sept. I believe the answer is Yes due to being a QLE I know COVID had muddied the waters a bit during 2020 and for health FSA extended relief again for 2021 regarding QLE’s. We did adopt these enhancements due to COVID for both 2020 and 2021. Your input/comments would be appreciated. Regards, Lexy

I have a db plan frozen 12/31/2013 SPD is really old 12/1/2000 I am assuming at least an SMM should have been done? plan doc was restated 1/1/2015 are there different requiremnts when a DB plan is frozen;ie. 5 years after a major change, 10 years otherwise? Much thanks Lexy

We have an ex-Exec started severance in Feb 2020 for net 3 years(before my time). She is having Roth 401k deductions taken out of her ongoing severance pay. Is that ok? It was my understanding our system is setup to stop 401k deferrals on severance pay and it seems to be for other employees. But perhaps since Roth is after-tax? Thanks Lexy

Our 401k plan doc allows uniform deferral beyond the comp limit; nothin in adoption agreement limits this- why woudl one?! Since the CEW, based on the 5% elected at beginning of employment would have been close to the 26K except for our HRIS system stopped the deferral at same time stopped match which is 100% to 5% off pay I agree with match stop but not deferral stop we have erisa counsel looking into If 401k should not have stopped some sort of selff correction program for missed deferral plus interest should occur correct? thanks Lexy

I touched base with our broker re; stop loss issues and he seemed to think no issue w/o touching base with our current stop=loss carrier luckily we are talking about a few folks Broker did say we would note this with our new stop-loss carrier since we are shopping stop-loss carriers for 1/1/21 Much thanks alexa

The match is every monthly payperiod I we restart at the deferral limit he won't reach the 26K; he missed 2 months of 401k in Sept & Oct; he nly has nov & dec Can we have payroll go back to ad the 2 months missed with Nov payroll?

Our CEO started in Feb of this year and was doing 401k % of 5% He is at 500K annual base comp He has now hit the 285K comp limit for 2020 in Sept 2020 and both his match and deferral stopped Match is 14,500 which is ok 5% of 285K But 401 k is capped at 14500 as well He is over age 50 If he had done say 10% when he started he would have been able to do 26K in 401k contribution Can we catch him up in 401k to 26K by suggesting he increase his 401k % from 5% t0 14% for final 2 months of plan year? Or is it too late to do this since he has hit the 28 Thanks Alexa

Thanks Brian We would not have employer paid FSA but on a pre-tax basis to continue to allow for 2021 FSA at their election; they are on payroll till severance payments end. Their COBRA doesn't start until end of their severance period. Don't think we will have discrimination testing issues since we offer benefits to all employees per our severance plan with exception of our smaller division who we doo not offer benefits upon severance. Would we have to do separate discrim test on just term group? Have another question regarding Health savings account which is new for 2020 What if 1 of these severed folks elects the high deductible plan , could we offer the health savings account to these terminated severance folks? Much thanks Alexa

We have several employees who terminated this year (7/31/2020) and as part of a severance agreement their H&W benefits were continued including health FSA 1 of the employees severance benefits continue into 2021 We offer changes at open enrollment . Should we offer him the opportunity to do health FSA for 2021? Does anyone see an issue for post July 2020 healthcare FSA deductions being allowed. Much thanks Alexa

We checked box in our prototype that we will exclude any compensation paid post termination Our attorney indicates that even the last paycheck which may include regular pay This was deferred on but not matched (system glitch stops match when anyone goes to inactive status) ERISA counsel indicates we need to refund the 401k deferral

Is a final lump sum payment of vacation pay eligible for 401k an match? We match each paycheck Our plan excludes pay after termination We did allow the employee to defer but no match we discovered an issue in our HRIS system wasn't calculating match for certain employees and are doing an audit of those who deferred but no match thanks, alexa

We have a non high deductible plan along with a HDHP Currenty our non HHP accumuates covered epenses simulataneou;sy while our HDHP accumulates epenses separtatelt going forward for 2021 we want to be consistent what is the standard? thanks Alexa

In our adoption agreement we exclude for deferral, match and employer discretionary contributions "all fringe benefits (cash and non-cash) . reimbursements or other expense allowances, moving expenses, deferred compensation, and welfare benefits. I am new having just started in July and working with auditor- they have picked a sample who was paid short term disability for about half the year (2019) and are questioning why she did not get a match true-up. We are self insured and pay the employee STD through payroll. She did have 401(k) deferrals withheld on the STD pay and the plan was amended 1/1/2019 to exclude this from all plan contribution types;i.e 401(k), match and employer discretionary. The employer discretionary did include the STD pay for compensation purposes as well What is meant by "welfare benefits"? Would employer paid STD pay be included in this welfare benefit exclusion? Much thanks! Alexa ps. 1 follow-up : we do exclude in another section of plan compensation "long term disability payments" but STD is not mentioned here

Can a severance plan be included as part of a H&W wrap plan document We currently have a separate severance plan document but are restating our H&W plan as a wrap plan we would like to avoid additional Final 5500 filing for the severance plan each year Thx