"Under the IRS hardship distribution 'safe harbor reasons', one safe harbor reason is for 'Burial or Funeral Expenses'. Payments for burial or funeral expenses for the employee's deceased parent, spouse, children, or dependents. What is the definition of children -- for examine is it limited to biological and legally adopted children. Or would a stepchild qualify. Assume the stepchild is not the primary beneficiary. Is there a distinction between your stepchild and your biological child for this purpose? I am not sure if they are a dependent but I can look into that because it would seem a dependent would qualify."

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"An employer is terminating their POP early (plan runs Jan 1 - Dec 31 ... they're terming it 8/31). The company itself is completely dissolving and there will not be any employees left. Do they still have to conduct the POP non-discrimination testing before the plan is dissolved?"

"A previous employer (whom we acquired, but didn't take on their 401(k)) had a short limitation year, and, thus, a small 415(c) limit. Accordingly, a few employees hit the 415(c) Limit and the previous employer reclassified some as 'catch-up' (even though they hadn't hit their deferral limit) so they could max out on 415. I don't think that affects us, but does anyone see any issues?"

"I have a client with an enhanced safe-harbor match 401k plan ($1 for $1 up to 6%.) When negotiating salary contracts for new employees, the client wanted to tell some employees (none are excluded) that their negotiated salary will be reduced by the 6% safe-harbor match as well as the 6% deferral if they sign up for the plan. I told them they can not do that, and as there's not rhyme or reason to the employees that the plan sponsor wants this to affect, it can't really be fixed by excluding a class or some other document provision. The client asked me where these rules are written and to provide in writing. I can't seem to find anything that specifically says a plan sponsor can't reduce an employee's pay in order to receive an employer contribution. (Obviously the salary is reduced by employee deferrals.) Any help with written guidance would be appreciated."

"We have a SH plan where the business has sold. The employees now work for new company and all have rolled over to the new company's plan. Only the former owner remains and wants to keep the plan -- so it is essentially back to being a soloK next year for 2024. I have reviewed the instructions for the 5500SF and EZ and only see the requirements for being eligible to file 5500EZ. Does the owner have to keep filing 5500SF or can he start filing 5500EZ?"

"The IRS entered into a closing agreement with plan sponsor agreeing to treat their DB plan as disqualified. Plan sponsor filed Form 5500 with an explanation stating the Sched SB is not required due to the provisions of the closing agreement. The IRS is threatening penalties for non-filing of Sched SB. Based on the instructions and the regs is a Sched SB required for a disqualified plan?"

"A 401k plan's eligibility requirements are age 18 and One Year of Service. Let's say an employee without a Year of Service earns 500 hours in 2021, 2022, and 2023, is age 18 on January 1, 2024. Is the plan permitted to continue to exclude the employee until after they have attained age 21, or does the plan's age 18 requirement apply for purposes of the LTPT rules?"

"If a bonus is paid out to a participant after they have already entered the plan, but the period for which the bonus compensation was earned was before they had entered the plan is this eligible compensation to defer?"