Bill Presson

Are the benefits insured? I assume so, but can you verify. Is there a wrap document? I'm assuming not, but verify. If you don't know what it is, you don't have one. So assuming you have insured benefits, you then determine which ones have 100 or more participants at the beginning of the year. For each benefit that meets that requirement, you have to file a 5500.

The education can be obtained without the initials. The initials are important for different reasons. When I was atarting out in my twenties, the QPA was important to allow clients to presume my competency while giving me time to prove it. At this stage of my career, I don't need the initials to give me that time. My reputation does. I got the ERPA because I needed the ability to represent clients with a power of atty. That wasn't for the initials or education. So I was wondering.

BG, other than the initials and education, are you getting anything else out of the CPC? I got my ERPA earlier this year and debating on whether I would ever try to get anything else.

Find new attorneys. Seriously.

Here's what we tell clients (and our internal CPA staff). Hope this helps: The requirements for filing a Form 5500 for a welfare plan are very often misunderstood. Examples of welfare plans include: medical, dental and vision plans, long term and short term disability plans, group term life insurance, flexible spending accounts, accidental death and dismemberment insurance and prescription drug plans. Other plans may also qualify, but these are the most common. While many plans are required to file, the first step is to see if the plan is exempt. The following plans are exempt from filing: governmental and church plans, workers’ compensation or unemployment compensation plans, voluntary “employee pays all” plans (with some exceptions) and plans that meet the Small Plan Exception. Small Plan Exception: If a plan has fewer than 100 participants at the beginning of the plan year and is unfunded or insured, then no 5500 is required. Participants mean employees actually covered under the plan and do not include spouses and dependents. Individuals that are eligible but not enrolled are not included. An unfunded plan means that benefits are paid from the employer’s general assets. An insured plan means that benefits are paid through policies of insurance OTHER than stop-loss insurance. A plan can be a combination of unfunded and insured. If the plan does not meet any of the exceptions, then a 5500 must be filed and a summary annual report provided to each participant covered under the plan. The confusion generally started in 2001 when a requirement for cafeteria plans to file a 5500 using Schedule F was dropped. However, the requirement for the underlying welfare benefits (insurance, etc) did not change.

Our whole company uses Sharefile and really like it. We have about 25 people in our benefits group and 850 employees over all. I think you'll be happy with it.

Our parent company is a CPA firm. We hire interns all the time. Our eligibility for deferrals is first of the calendar quarter after hire, but our plan excludes interns not expected to work for more than 4 months. (match, etc is 1 year). We just have to test the coverage and if they do work more than 1000 hours in 12 months, they become eligible for the deferral and match. Some are hired for multiple internships, so this happens from time to time. I would think most large CPA or other professional firms recruiting colleges pretty hard would have something similar. BTW, I've never heard the "not allowed to provide benefits" excuse. Nice.

We're consulting on the employer mandate and other issues related to ACA. It's mostly because we're part of a CPA firm and the firm needs to offer this to our clients. But I don't see us doing anything related to ongoing compliance. Then again, I didn't see us doing this either.

Of course. The documents need to be done correctly, but this is done quite often.

Well, if I recall correctly, and incorrectly filed Form 5500 is deemed "not filed" for statute of limitations purposes, hence the statute "never runs." Arguably, "amending" a 5500 by definition means the original was not correct, so I would suggest, until the "corrected" amended 5500 is filed, the statute never actually began to run. Interesting. So if the IRS looked at a 5500 that was theoretically past the statute of limitations, but found an error, the statute never really ran to begin with?

Thanks to both for getting me down the right road and for the attachment! edited to add: this is for an outside, independent director. Mr. Gulia, please call me Bill.

I really hate trying to wade through the prohibited transaction issues. Just so you know. Not looking for chapter and verse here, just whether I'm headed in the right direction. Is a trustee/director of a mutual fund allowed to purchase that fund using assets of his self directed 401(k) account? I can't decide if it's really a retirement plan potential prohibited transaction or an issue that would cause a problem for the director regarding his independence on the board. Thanks.

Yes, each part of the plan has to meet the MV amount.

I'm assuming the new owner bought assets and not stock. The answer is yes, the new owner can adopt the existing plan as the new sponsor.

Additional issues include getting an actual appraisal and getting a full bond on the amount or needing an audit.

It might not be an issue if the participant chose to be in an illiquid asset. But it's likely a fiduciary issue if the participant wants the entire distribution. I think the trustee is on shaky ground.

I think that is the correct date.

I would be shocked if this were the case.

I've never been able to successfully use screen names so I'll just have to take my chances.

Sorry. My humor was way too veiled. Trying to tie in the targeting issue going on with the EO side.

Unless the plan document is written poorly (so please check to make sure what it says), the compensation limit is a testing limit. So, with the previous caveat, a participant can defer and receive appropriate matches at any time of the year.

Now might be a good time to stand up to them and tell them to stop targeting these kind of plans.

If the model itself is a DIA (which I believe to be the case), then I'm pretty sure you would not have to provide a notice to change funds in the model lineup 30 days before the change. You might still want to provide information on the change and why, but I don't think there is a time frame. I would liken it to the purchase sale of investments inside a mutual fund.

ppapdx, Thanks for the info. What a great example of a stupid answer from the IRS. Wish we had this conversation prior to the BCOS earlier this month because I would have liked to see Monika Templeman defend this position.

We actually have the same issue with our own plan and I'm betting almost every company of any size does whether they realize it or not. When we have drawings at firm meetings or award gift cards etc., those amounts are required to be put on the employee's W-2. But there is no way for there to be any withholding. So our attorney has said while it is taxable compensation and it is eligible for employer contribution allocation, there is no requirement for a deferral because there was no possibility of deferral. It is similar to imputed income from life insurance in excess of $50,000, etc. We've had the plan audited by the IRS a few years ago and they concurred.