5500 to 5500EZ

[Guest jhuffstick@aol.com]

Doctor client with 3 employees - fiscal year 5/1/13 to 4/30/14

In past had to file a 5500 instead of SF as multiple assets in real estate

The plan is terminated, employees paid out during the year. The doctors account balance has not been paid out in full so.... Beginning of year 4 participants and end of year 1 participant, doctor only.

Can I file an EZ (apparently cannot file 5500 with 1 participant, and cannot file SF due to assets in market value not readily available (ie real eastate)?

[Buffys Redrum]

You will need to file a Form 5500 (with 4 EEs at the beginning of the Plan Year and 1 EE at the end). If the plan does not meet the EZ requirements for the full plan year, the EZ is not available.

[Guest jhuffstick@aol.com]

Thanks - that was my original thought but wanted to confirm that I was not supposed to file an EZ

[TPApril]

It's not completely clear to me that you need to continue to file Form 5500 (or SF) in this case due to having >1 ee at boy but only 1 at eoy (ignoring spouse issues for this post). In a sense I thought the spirit of the EZ was that personal assets of 1 person did not have to be made public information, which would be so if only 1 person is a participant at eoy.

Now if plan qualifies to file 5500-SF would seem can submit as one-person plan, but in this case if a standard 5500 is filed it would be public.

Looking for confirmation that in this situation EZ can be filed.

[austin3515]

I don;t think so either. Look at the compliance questions. "during the plan year." Those questions apply and would be unanswerable if the "one participant plan" box was checked. The instructions do not include the words "for the whole year" though when listing out the requirements for one-participant-plan status (ie., it only says "plan covers only owners" -- it does not say "plan covers only owners for the whole year"). But I think that because the form covers the whole year, the exceptions from filing as an ERISA plan would not apply if not met for the whole year. For example, if there were late deposits, those should be reported on the compliance questions. Similarly, if this was a pooled a plan, and participant assets were invested in the owners vacation house, the prohibited transaction should be disclosed on G.

So you would have to file the regular 5500 due to the real estate. You can do an EZ/SF one-participant-plan next year.