Researching Relius alternatives

[ASmithCPA]

Hi, all.

We are in the process of looking at an alternative to Relius for our TPA practice.  I've read through the handful of threads here regarding options but do have some questions which I am hoping someone can help me out with.

We've been Relius users forever...we bought in when it was Pentabs and I cut my TPA teeth in Quantech.  I'm an old dog, not necessarily wanting to learn new tricks, but it is becoming more and more obvious that Relius just may not be "it" for us anymore.  It's simply not what it used to be, and that really makes me sad.  The support is so, so, so bad now...it's just a shame.  I fondly remember the days of a call to Jacksonville and awesome support with Alan Gross, John Reasoner or Marlene Stein...but that's gone.  Ahhh...the good old days!  

Anyhow...as a jumping off point, we are a small TPA firm with about 80 plans but are definitely in a growth mode.  We service only DC plans.  We still have a portion of our plans as trustee-directed balance forward plans, but those are becoming less prevalent.  Most new plans are using an investment platform/recordkeeper like AF, Hancock (Manulife...what come around goes around) and Ascensus Vanguard.  We do not do any daily val recordkeeping, so there is no need for the functionality of the VRU, trading, etc.  I also just don't see us moving to that in the future, either.

We are a CPA firm, so I use our engagement binder for workpapers and doing the trust accounting work for determination of investment income from the trustee directed investment accounts.

Currently, we use Relius Administration, Relius Web Client and Relius Documents.  We don't have any proposal or portal software at this point.

I've been looking at FT William and have sat through a couple of demos there; for Document and Compliance.  There is a lot of really intriguing pieces there but am a bit confused.  I've seen in other posts here saying that FT William doesn't do "recordkeeping" It is basically just compliance testing.  I understand that they don't do daily valuation, but would it handle our trustee-directed, balance forward plans in a way that makes sense?  Basically, can we track participant balances, vesting, and allocate contributions and investment earnings to their "account" in a fashion similar to Relius and report to participants and clients as needed?  I've also heard great stuff about their support.  Granted, that's their sales guys touting how awesome it is, but it can't be worse than Relius is now.

ASC looks so clunky and frankly, like it was last updated in the 90s.  Our IT department really is pushing for a web-based solution.  Managing updates/servers for ASC look like a total drag, and it just appears to be "old technology".  Am I missing something about it?

Datair is also an option, but I am not at all familiar with it.  Thoughts?

Any insight of people who have converted to one of these other options would really be appreciated. I'd love a dialogue on this stuff and I feel like there are lots of us out here facing the same challenges with Relius.  I have a small budget to help grease the skids for anyone who can spend some time talking to me about real world use and experiences of ASC, Datair or FT Williams as we embark on our process.  Not talking big bucks here, but a token of my appreciation for your time.  🙂

[Gadgetfreak]

Get a full demo with FTW. It does balance forward RK. Their support - even after being acquired by Wolters Kluwer - remains fantastic. The web-based interface is also ideal so there is nothing to install. If you use them for docs, gov't forms and admin (testing/valn/etc) there is a lot of integration. 

[RatherBeGolfing]

15 hours ago, ASmithCPA said:

I understand that they don't do daily valuation, but would it handle our trustee-directed, balance forward plans in a way that makes sense?  Basically, can we track participant balances, vesting, and allocate contributions and investment earnings to their "account" in a fashion similar to Relius and report to participants and clients as needed?  I've also heard great stuff about their support.  Granted, that's their sales guys touting how awesome it is, but it can't be worse than Relius is now.

Yes to all the above.  

15 hours ago, ASmithCPA said:

ASC looks so clunky and frankly, like it was last updated in the 90s.  Our IT department really is pushing for a web-based solution.  Managing updates/servers for ASC look like a total drag, and it just appears to be "old technology".  Am I missing something about it?

Datair is also an option, but I am not at all familiar with it.  Thoughts?

ASC is clunky to me as well.  If ASC seemed like the 90s, Datair is the 80s.  They both (and relius) have more total features than FTW, but I have never missed any of them after migrating to FTW.  I have migrated many plans from Relius, ASC, and Datair to FTW.  

 

15 hours ago, ASmithCPA said:

Any insight of people who have converted to one of these other options would really be appreciated.

Migration from Relius is pretty simple.  FTW will help you build a DER to extract the data, and then you use a template in FTW to import. 80 plans won't be that bad to migrate.

[EJS_TPA]

Hi, 

I sent you a message about this. Happy to help. 

[mbvs]

Not sure how long ago you reviewed ASC. They launched web-access in January to their Valuation System.  There is also a conversion process that can accommodate historical transactions or various accumulated data.  ASC can handle pretty much any plan design including new comp, DB, DBDC Combo, ESOPs etc. as well as periodic valuations.  

[ASmithCPA]

On 8/25/2025 at 8:32 AM, mbvs said:

Not sure how long ago you reviewed ASC. They launched web-access in January to their Valuation System.  There is also a conversion process that can accommodate historical transactions or various accumulated data.  ASC can handle pretty much any plan design including new comp, DB, DBDC Combo, ESOPs etc. as well as periodic valuations.  

They do have web based but it's not a true cloud solution.  It is similar to Relius ASP where you, in essence, log into FIS's server for access.