Bill Presson

Pretty sure the OP is referring to distribution paperwork in this case and that's our experience with Nationwide. They require wet signatures and won't do any distribution steps online.

EE is 100% vested.

Also (let me just mention because I didn't realize for a long time) the matching contribution is not based on any compensation limit. So if someone makes $500,000 per year and defers $14,000, the match is also $14,000.

The participants have the right if it's in the document. The document either needs to be amended to remove the option or the employer needs to find new service providers.

Ms Rita, The QNEC is an employer contribution and doesn't count against your $20,500 limit. You're eligible to defer the additional catch up amount in 2022 as long as you turn 50 anytime during 2022. So, if you want to do the additional deduction, contact HR/payroll. There are no IRS forms that you need to complete related to the QNEC. FWIW, QNEC stands for Qualified NonElective Contribution. It's an employer contribution typically made to allow the plan to pass a discrimination test rather than give refunds back to people. Since it's an employer contribution, it won't show up on your w-2 at all.

Termination date isn't when the plan evaporates. It just means no more contributions for compensation earned after that date. So just do all the stuff you would normally for a 2022 calendar year plan. Then do the distributions and file the final return for the 2023 (short) year.

Likely SOL means something different for the client in this scenario.

Agree with EBEC on the issues of different tax years. I think that's important if relevant here. Also, how is the money going to be "paid back" and in what amount? Reduced final check? Actually writing a check back? and is that amount the gross amount of the bonus or the after tax amount?

Peter, we do it automatically as part of the participant statements that we provide. The calculations are built into our admin software, so it's not a big deal.

The only two things I can think of is that you have someone eligible employed on the last day to whom you aren't allocating a TH contribution or you have someone receiving an allocation based on their date of participation comp and (for whatever reason) that allocation isn't 3% of their full year compensation.

We have a lot of those plans.

You have a 415 excess or a 404 nondeductible suspense account issue.

Thanks Peter. So this is saying that the instructions and software audit checks are incorrect.

Bob, that's what the entire discussion is about and the conclusion in this thread looks like it can't be done. Please explain how it can.

This is thinking strictly from the 1950's believing you're protecting the stay at home wife. What about the wife that has a decent job but an abusive home life. She wants to leave, but the only money she really has is in her 401(k). But the spousal consent requirement for any distribution or loan guarantees she can never access the funds to save herself because the husband would never agree. Perhaps consent requirements going away aren't "always to the detriment of those most in need..."

If we had clients continuing to operate on a different trust agreement, we noted that on the signature page. It was an option in the software. Did you do anything like that?

The voluntary after tax contributions then have to satisfy another ACP test on their own.

Peter, I'm not sure there's a good answer, but at least communicating with the document provider ahead of the announcement would have been nice. We're all in tough situations trying to make our businesses as efficient as possible while remaining responsive to the clients needs. We deal with a lot of RKs (and brokers) and they can't all use the exact same defaults that we would prefer. Just mainly wasn't happy that there didn't seem to be any concern for the work that might be caused for us (not all RKs but a handful).

From everything I'm hearing from others Belgarath's noticing of the (stupid) split was accurate. We've been telling people as we went through the C3 restatement that another amendment would be needed by the end of the year. I may get overruled, but I would rather just go ahead and get it all done. We have a handful of clients that were put on C3 before our move to our current document provider. I was going to use this opportunity to just restate them as well so everything is on the same system. I also don't want to maintain "operational" decisions any longer than necessary. Finally, to Peter's question, the RKs that bugged me the most were the ones that said "we're doing X unless you tell us no" when they weren't the document providers and it was different than the defaults we were using for clients.

Why does this matter?

Generally, the plan either refunds the amount to the employee or forfeits the money and makes the employee whole outside the plan. The goal is to put the employee and the plan back in the same place they would have been if the employee hadn't entered early. I interpret that to disgorge deferrals plus gain or makeup the loss. If the plan forfeits the deferral (and it had a loss) and makes the employee whole outside the plan, the employee would be better off than a refund minus a loss.

I would recommend doing so.

There might be a couple of fixes: return the money, amend to let the few participants in early, etc. All, I think, based on the numbers of people. But, just to snipe a bit, I'm betting the TPA didn't allow ineligible participants to defer, it was the HR/payroll people for the employer.

If the leasing company excludes all the owners (who are automatically HCE), then they have a better shot at passing coverage tests. If the inhouse employees are all NHCEs, then you can definitely cover just them and automatically pass. We've done similar things for restaurant chains, etc.

Signature date is different than effective date. To me, it's late.