TPAJake

Long term maximum security incarceration. TPA included

You will likely need a professional estimate of the repairs in order to justify any amounts you request. You would submit that estimate along with your hardship withdrawal request form to the Administrator.

Several very large EPCRS filings related to auto-escalation failures. If anybody has ever seen a QACA written to allow the skipping of years, I would be surprised. I've been wrong before though

The Plan should not be silent on this. However when in doubt, auto-increase. If you get a fresh election on file every year, this can be avoided going forward because if they fail to return the election, auto-increase. Never ever violate the provisions of the Document over somebody's 1%, it's not worth it, ask me how I know this. 1--Auto increase 1/1/18 unless you get an positive election to stay at 4%, no skipping years. 2--Auto increase 1/1/18 unless you get an positive election to stay at 5%, no skipping years. There's a theme at work here as you can see, auto escalation is an elemental part of a QACA.

I think my clients & brokers are reading this--I've had to answer several "in case of a lawsuit" questions today...

I would love to attend that, is it available on the web during or after? I can't make it to Philly

I COULD NOT AGREE MORE.

I would agree with the HR outsourcing assessment, but we only deal with the 401k portion--I don't want to sell HR teams across the country short by pretending 401k is all they do. Some bundles provide notice service, some don't, but we monitor either way for proper execution. Some don't even know their own policies & procedures. I have not been impressed with most of the bundled provider's ability to make their own recordkeeping system match the Plan Document, but I'm sure some are better than others.

Of course a TPA could do all of the things we do, they just have historically refused to do so. Many of the competitors in the 3(16) space are in fact TPA's that offer this as an add-in service & charge higher fees as Austin implied. I would wholeheartedly agree that signing a 5500 is not burdensome, or even worth charging for by itself, it's simply something Joe the plumber is not comfortable doing. As far as reducing the other burdens of running a plan, we do take large amount of admin work off the Sponsor, but we all know Plaintiff's Attorney is listing the Sponsor first every time--No stopping that with a 3(16) contract. As far as what I do, it is again defined by each contract but so far today: Fix incorrect payroll limits & calculations in a client's ADP account, send incorrect testing back to a TPA for revision, revise incorrect plan provisions in a bundled provider's system, and mailed out a fee change notice for 4000 Participants...It's about lunch time I think!

That's one of the reasons I wanted to have this discussion, as I feel somewhat qualified to answer these questions from both sides--I was a TPA for a decade & came here with a similarly skeptical attitude. I've been pleasantly surprised at the reality of this service & the response from clients. We all know that in the case of litigation, the Plan Sponsor will be first against the wall, regardless of whether there is a co-fiduciary arrangement & I'm not an ERISA Attorney.

We do indeed process payroll for most of our clients & I have a dedicated team for payroll tasks. We have direct access to their payroll systems & file the submission each period, though I'll refrain from sharing which providers are terrible. I'm sure most of you know already! All the client does is deposit the money, which we also monitor. We do have that access & we do detect these things, it's a huge part of our job. The TPA's we work with love it.

That is a question for the person who writes the contract--I just work here. What's with all the animosity this group seems to be directing at 3(16) providers? Is it just a perceived lack of value, or are we considered some nefarious force that's trying to steal clients?

Most of the major providers allow e-sign once you've signed in as the participant & I've only seen wet signatures accepted for spousal consent. The docusign thing has been growing in popularity, John Hancock uses that system quite a bit.

No, I'm pretty sure whistleblowing against the plan sponsor that hires us is not covered in our contract. We do however find plenty of unintentional issues that we refer to TPA or other party for correction. Once that correction is prepared, we do check it & sign as plan administrator. As far as monitoring is concerned, I think it's pretty unlikely that my client will monitor me in any way, but we would monitor the investment providers, advisors & other parties on their behalf. Austin, I get the impression from all of your posts over the years that you go above & beyond for your clients. I applaud you for that, but you are the exception, not the rule. I can tackle your list tomorrow, but for now I'll say that in general, if they checked every box on our contract, we are responsible for those items. We would be processing the payrolls, checking the comp used for various purposes, monitoring those mystery HCE situations & bringing a missed bonus contribution to the client's attention. We just find it a lot sooner than the TPA can. We would also be listed on the fidelity bond & 5500 as plan administrator, so if anybody is getting sued, I'm pretty sure we would be named in the suit as well.

Sorry RBG, I guess my search skills aren't what they used to be--Let me know if there are any unresolved issues in those threads I may be able help with. Our services are defined by the contract, but generally range from mailing notices all the way up to payroll submissions & census preparation. There's a lot of things in between, but essentially we take the daily operations of the Plan away from the Sponsor so they can go back to manufacturing widgets, or running hotels, or pumping oil, etc. As a TPA, I always hated sending tasks to the client & praying that they would complete them! Our TPA partners & bundled providers actually love us because they get solid census data, pulled from the payroll system directly by a 401k plan professional who knows what to look for--They no longer have to rely on an 85 year old payroll part-timer's data or the revolving door of HR & payroll contacts at the Plan Sponsor. To answer Mr. Gulia, we would certainly not call upon Participants to sue a client, but I feel like you knew that already. We would keep the records & contribution reconciliations required by Counsel in the event of such a case though. We would also ensure that those amounts are properly listed as receivable until the funding is satisfied. There is a fair bit of marketing that goes into all aspects of this industry, but I can assure you the service we provide is very real & different from what a TPA would normally offer. Obviously I'm not here to sell you anything, that's not my role & even if it was I would not walk into this lion's den peddling my wares! I do think there is a natural tendency for TPA's to dismiss 3(16) as an unnecessary expense & I want to share my experience, which has been contradictory to that opinion. Our clients include small plans & large, both bundled & unbundled--Believe me they all have their "we don't do that" items. For me, it's more about the convenience for the Sponsor & less about the fiduciary liability, but that does have some value for the client. It's important to remember that we are discussing concepts on a daily basis that are very foreign to the plumbers & golf course managers of the world, but they still need a 401k.

In light of the recent spread of 3(16) service providers in the 401k industry, I think the subject has earned another look (we haven't discussed since 2014 that I can find). Full disclosure: I have recently switched from a TPA shop to a national 3(16) provider, so I may be a bit biased! I always had a similar view to those expressed in the 2014 thread linked below, but since joining the 3(16) space I've really been surprised by just how much we take out of the Sponsor's task list & the amount of thanks we constantly receive from clients. I'm sure plenty of you have run across 3(16) providers in various capacities over the last 3 years, so have any of your opinions changed? Do you have any questions about the blurry line that exists between us, the TPA & the client?

I always have trouble with these as well--It's obvious that it's not JUST a repair, but at the same time I'm no contractor, so who am I to argue with their estimates?

Won't you become a non-US person receiving non-US income?

If no Employees have ever been auto-enrolled, what's the rush to remove it? I agree it seems allowable, but why not wait until year end to do so?

I once had a case the opposite of that, where the murdered spouse was the Participant & the Employer refused to honor the murdering spouse's claim as beneficiary. Big mess, took years.

I agree with ETA on the technical basis, but in very non-technical terms it doesn't pass "the smell test" for me either.

https://www.betterment.com/resources/research/tax-loss-harvesting-white-paper/ Hopefully its ok to post links to these sites, otherwise my apologies... I don't know that you have to buy anything, but you would need to have an account there to actually use the service. If you understand the concepts involved & are willing to put in the time, any investor could accomplish the same thing manually

Check out Betterment, they actually have a tool that coordinates your pre-tax Employer Plan & your after-tax investment account (such as you would fund with said ADP refund) to actively "harvest" losses & reduce taxes between the 2 accounts. They might have something very close to the research you're after

From Forbes.com, can it be true?! President Trump has signed an executive order instructing the Labor Department to re-consider the controversial ruling passed in the middle of 2016 imposing a sort of “qualified fiduciary rule” on retirement accounts only, the so-called “DOL Ruling.”

"Should" is not a word that Paychex or ADP or any other mega-payroll co cares about. We have had all sorts of problems with these companies lately. I even had ADP pretend they didn't know what a safe harbor basic match was the other day & they made the client submit a spreadsheet of example calcs--Really? After all that, they could not get their system to match the Roth deferrals in the same manner as the pre-tax. I'll never understand the appeal of these payroll giants.