"I've always seen interest-bearing cash included in the schedule, but something recently made me question whether it should be in the case where the balance is for clearing transactions only and is not a participant-directed or -selectable option. I cannot find a formal definition of "investment assets" or "assets held for investment" and whether that might be to the exclusion of such an account. Still leaning towards including it."

"A CPA/Auditor friend ... is auditing a 401(k) Plan that has been 'frozen' since January 1, 2020. The reason for the freeze was to correct operational defects in the plan from 2017-2019; which, after she described it, was failure to complete compliance testing and make appropriate refunds to HCE's. Her question was whether the plan should be considered terminated, due to lack of contributions for 3 years (still frozen as of today); my thought is that perhaps the Plan Sponsor (still a viable company and not subject to closing or bankruptcy) froze the plan to avoid 100% vesting on the matching contributions going into the plan. My response to her was to question the plan sponsor as to whether, once the defects are corrected, was going to unfreeze the plan and let deferrals resume. Otherwise consider formally terminating the plan. Any thoughts on this? And second, a participant took a $50,000 loan in June, 2022 for the purchase of a principal residence, payable over 30 years. However, the house was purchased in December, 2021 and closed in February, 2022. Isn't this out of order? And then the participant 'refinanced' the loan in September 2023. And, just to make it more interesting, the participant is the owner of the company."

"Safe Harbor 401k has the standard one year of service 1000 hours rule. The owner wants to bring their spouse into the plan. The spouse does work for the company but hasn't been on the payroll. Is this permitted? The onwer wants to start the spouse on the roster so that the spouse can max on the deferral side and recieve the SH match as well."

"A QDRO was received and approved on a participant's pension (DB) benefit. The order was a separate-interest order (i.e. not a stream-of-payment). It turns out, it never should have been filed, and both parties agree (according to the participant, anyway). The Participant has not begun receiving payments. We don't know yet if the AP has.

• Assuming she has not begun her benefit, can we simply have them provide an amended QDRO, reversing everything?
  • In the meantime, is it okay practice to lock her benefit until we can get it settled? (I realize this would only be necessary if she thinks she is entitled to the benefit, but we just don't know yet).
• If she has begun her benefit, is there anything we can do? We can't stop the benefit once it is in place, so the only option I can think of is for him to get a 100% stream-of-payment QDRO on what she is currently receiving.'

"Employer sponsors a 401(k) Plan. A while back a group of employees under the plan were moved to the Union Plan. The participants contribute to the union plan however, their balance from pre-union remains in the Employer sponsored. Plan A participant who has an account balance and who is now a union employee requested a loan from the 'non' union Plan. Technically this participant is not an active participant. The participant is coded as inactive on the original 401(k) Plan. Since he is not active (which is a requirement for a loan) is he eligible for a loan?"

"Generally when we file Form 5500 we do so on an Accrual Basis. I'm taking over two 401(k) plans, where the previous TPA has been filing the Form 5500 on a Cash Basis. I assume there is no issue, one way or the other? Is it better to continue filing them on a Cash Basis, or should we consider switching over to an accrual basis?"

"Hello All - would like to have a regular advisor email list to send out newsletters too, especially with Secure Act changes. Is there a particular company that is better, to one, purchase the list for certain areas and two prepare the newsletter with input from me and perform the service of the email blast? Thank you."

"I am assisting a new hire for a 401k client (my firm serves as third party administrator). The Plan Sponsor's owner (small company) would like me to train this new employee both with respect to an overview of the IRS, DOL, etc requirements for 401k plans, and also issues that are specific to this plan, which I'm glad to do for the this long time client. I also think it might be beneficial for this employee, to take a course taught by a professional educator, that introduces someone who does not have previous job experience that involved the day to day operation of a 401k plan. Can anyone recommend an online (day-long, for example) course for this employee? Specific websites, company names are appreciated. I've searched my local CPA society offerings and done some basic web searching, and of course I'm aware that that there are hundreds of options for specific issues within the 401k world ('EPCRS update' for example), but I'm not having much luck finding a '401k for beginners' overview course."