lost/missing participant

[Chippy]

We are working on a plan termination and there is one participant left to pay out. THis is sort of a unique situation, here's the background.

The plan belonged to a restaurant. THe restaurant burned down about 15 years ago. Then the owner died and the plan was forgotten. The owner's wife became aware of it and contacted us last year to help her with the termination. We brought the plan up to date, and have paid out all the participants except for one. This remaining participant has a balance of about $20,000. They have tried to locate him, but keep hitting dead ends. Here's the real problem, in addition to not having a last know address, they do not have this guys social security number. They can't open an IRA for him without the SSNO. So, does anyone have any suggestions on what to do with his money so the plan can be closed?

thanks

[MoJo]

We are working on a plan termination and there is one participant left to pay out. THis is sort of a unique situation, here's the background.

The plan belonged to a restaurant. THe restaurant burned down about 15 years ago. Then the owner died and the plan was forgotten. The owner's wife became aware of it and contacted us last year to help her with the termination. We brought the plan up to date, and have paid out all the participants except for one. This remaining participant has a balance of about $20,000. They have tried to locate him, but keep hitting dead ends. Here's the real problem, in addition to not having a last know address, they do not have this guys social security number. They can't open an IRA for him without the SSNO. So, does anyone have any suggestions on what to do with his money so the plan can be closed?

thanks

I could give you my bank information.....

No SSN? ouch. Well, I've used "Intellius.com" with pretty good results, with little information as an input. Sometimes I've found relatives who may know about the lost participant. How about escheating the benefit to the state (not liked by the feds, but is there another choice?)?

[mbozek]

Escheat may not be in option because many states will not accept assets from a plan subject to ERISA because of the preemption issue.

There are many reasons why the participant cannot be located such as death, departure from US, change of identity, etc.

Does plan permit forfeiture of benefits if participant cannot be located?

Under PPA there was suposed to be an option for terminating DC plans to transfer assets of missing particpants to the PBGC but I dont know if there has been any implimentaton of this law.

[Hojo]

If you have an old address, you can always try the following.....

https://www.berwyngroup.com/db/Samples.asp