GMK

Happy Birthday, J. P. Morgan. A nice, round 175 years since his birth on April 17, 1837.

I'll grant you that. Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor, Jr. (or Lewis, as The Coach called him) was, in the early years at least, every bit as good.

As noted previously, the greatest basketball player of all time.

The company by-laws might also say something about procedures for Board actions without a meeting.

Nice find, Belgarath. And I like the split infinitive ("it may be possible for an individual to not meet").

Wow. The sorcerer is quite a lyricist. Good eddings ... sorry, edit that: good ending, too.

NGP - some employers do, some don't. Your choice. As Mr. Q says, check your health plan document (not the insurance policy) and the cafeteria plan document, if any. Also check whether state laws require something like this. Might be quickest to ask the person who told you that you have to reimburse these two employees why she/he thinks that is so.

Just off the top, I'm used to seeing the money go the other way, but ... The 401(k) Plan Doc would have to allow for a distribution out of the 401(k), which usually requires some kind of trigger or defined circumstances. The ESOP Plan Doc would have to allow for the rollovers into the ESOP. Then, I think you'd want to do some education about putting all of one's eggs into one basket. No doubt that at times an ESOP can be the best investment you can find, but it lacks investment diversification, ... as in, it can be risky.

Good audits aren't cheap, but they're probably the least expensive insurance (or at least assurance) that the 401(k) committee is running the Plan properly. Formal outside review of the plan is good not only for the Plan (think qualified status, fines for errors, etc.), but also for your own peace of mind and assurance that you are doing the right things for the participants. (I don't do audits. I run a couple plans, with help from the TPA's and auditors we hire.)

Don't have time to look up cites, but in general the shares in your ESOP account are ignored in determining ownership %s and the like. The shares allocated to ESOP participants' accounts do not preclude participation in the cafeteria plan. The ESOP owns the shares in the ESOP. Consider that if you were a real owner (owned shares) of an S corp, you'd pay income tax on the corp profits.

Some quick thoughts: If the distribution is eligible for rollover, the distributing Plan cannot require or prohibit a participant's election of a rollover, and the plan cannot limit where a rollover goes if it's rolling over into an IRA or qualified employer plan. A rollover can go to a qualified employer's plan if the receiving plan will accept the rollover. If the retired person has cashed out their 401(k) balance, then the 401(k) can say 'No, you closed your 401(k) account, and we have no way to open an account for a non-employee.' The plan cannot require participants to take Diversification distributions.

We all generally agree with you, Austin. But the "TPA" part is the 37 bps, not the 20.

fussy detail - State law may give children coverage eligibility to age 26, even if federal law does not.

Wondering if it might be worth writing to the clerk of the court that issued the Court Order. I'm not a lawyer, so any comments?

OK, I got them backwards. The 0.2% is in the range, give or take, depending on what they do. I'll let Bill respond to $44k for the TPA. They must do a lot more than testing and 5500.

Keep in mind that different policies will have different coverages, which in some cases will be better than required by law. What does the patient's policy say?

I fully agree. I assumed perhaps too many things, like that 'third party financial consultant' means TPA, and that this plan is set up with only asset-based fees and no per participant fees. But I see now that the 0.2% fee may be the calculated percentage of $24k of fixed fees. And as you say, whether that's a bargain depends on several factors, not the least of which is number of participants. I think the other point rcline46 made, about revenue sharing to pay the advisor, etc., is equally important. I agree with your pricing model for TPA's, but some plans pay for everything with an asset-based fee. Again assuming that 'administrator' in the OP means the financial advisor, then I think they could do better at the $12 million asset level (but I could be wrong). And it's probably a good rate if the advisor provides investment advice (as a fiduciary) to individual participants as part of the service to the plan. If it were my plan, I'd put out an RFP.

What does the patient's own policy say about coverage for colonoscopies and polyp removal? Some related reading (removing the polyp may change the billing): http://bizmology.hoovers.com/2012/01/27/pp...about-the-bill/ http://preventingcolorectalcancer.org/taxonomy/term/30

These boards are about benefits, so that's totally out of the realm of possibility. What do you think this is, rocket surgery?

If I'm reading this right: The 0.20% for a TPA is in the ball park, some cost a little more, some a little less. The 0.37% for an advisor seems high when you've got as much as $12 million in assets. But it might be OK, depending on what the advisor provides, for example, if the advisor is a co-fiduciary. Another factor is whether you have access to low expense ratio classes of mutual funds, like investor and institutional shares as opposed to no-load A shares and R shares, and what happens to revenue sharing. In other words, are participants paying a higher expense ratio to pay some of the plan costs in addtion to the 0.57%? (Like what rcline46 said.) Issuing an RFP will get you answers, and it's considered good due dilegence every 3-5 years. Some proposals will answer all your questions. For others, be prepared to go back and ask about the specifics of what the fees are, how they are paid, what services are (and are not) provided, etc. Is personal data shared? Do they mail statements to participants or is everything online? Is there a phone center for participants who aren't online? What information back-up and hacker protections are provided? And the usual questions about participant education (and advice if any), non-discrim testing, 5500, 1099, cost of restatements, limitations on funds available to the plan and their share classes, and co-fiduciary status. It's a big project, but enlightening.

Really? I'd be surprised if the consent is not in the pre-procedure paperwork that the patient signed. I recall that these papers include statements like 'if you die, it isn't our fault' and 'if we find something, we're gonna take it out' and like that. And I'm no help otherwise, either, but in this case, I'd argue that the screening is still a screening, whose purpose is to find suspicious stuff. Removal of the polyp is a separate procedure, for which I suppose the greedy b***ds could charge you. Was the patient advised (or did the patient have reasonable access to information to know) that the whole procedure would be regarded as a surgery, and none of it would be considered a screening, if they found and removed a polyp? Did the patient have the opportunity to choose to have any polyps that were found left in place, to decide later whether to have them removed? This is a reminder to all of us that it is always a good idea to call the insurer to confirm in detail what's covered before you have any procedure done.

I think you have to go back to court and revise the divorce decree to give some of your pension to your former spouse. Generally, the divorce decree is a domestic relations order, but in most cases, it does not have all the details to be a Qualified DRO for plan distribution purposes. That's why there's a separate document. But the separate document follows the divorce decree in specifying who gets what. So, if the divorce decree, signed by the court, does not give a former spouse part of the other person's pension plan, then the separate document cannot split the pension assets. This is because a plan participant is barred from assigning her/his pension assets to another person, except under very limited circumstances, like under the terms of a QDRO in connection with a court authorized/approved split up.

Here's a previous discussion (read through it to get all the corrections): http://benefitslink.com/boards/index.php?s...igher++employer And the link in post #3 doesn't work, but here it is: http://www.mhmbiz.com/ResourceCenter/doc/FF/MHMR-FF0708a.pdf and go to the bottom of page 3 for POP plans. Just pass the Eligibility test.

Correction: It ain't spring yet. I too am enjoying this heat wave (a lot), but it's still winter. And it's going to be winter all the way to Tuesday (12:14 a.m. CDT). I think I could get used to un-brutal winters.

Ah, ha! Depends on where you are, geographically, that is. Being here in the heart of the heartland, my edit hit the target 1:59, but it probably says 2:59 at Tom's place. Good thing that time is just a construct (yes, a useful one), or I'd be really confused.