"Company F sponsors a 401k PS plan and wants to join a MEP. Can they terminate their current plan and roll the money into the MEP as a rollover contribution (I don't think they can take it out due to successor plan rules)? Of course, they want to do this immediately.... and both plans are SHNEC. I figure as long as they give each person 3% of total comp for 2024 (probably all into the MEP), that's what counts. Any other pitfalls?"

"Can someone please confirm that the 415 limit is per unrelated plan? If someone participated in a plan for the first part of the year and maxed out their contributions at 23,000 (in 2024) and then went to another job with a 401k plan that permitted after tax contributions -- with the new plan, would the participant be able to contribute a total of $69,000. Do I have this correct? Can anyone point me to a US Treasury Reg or IRS document that spells out that the 415 limit is per plan and not by participant?"

"Hi All, I'm a relatively new EB/EC attorney and looking to increase my knowledge of ESOPs; how to create, administer, etc. Do you have any recommendations for secondary sources, guidebooks, etc. to help me learn more?"

"I am getting mired in what should be a very simple problem: Whether the employer has an obligation to contribute earnings in a situation in which an employee's entire after-tax contribution for the year is correct, but the timing of it is wrong.

"Example: Susie has regular compensation of $345,000, plus a $50,000 bonus she receives on January 15. She elects to make an after-tax contribution of 5% of compensation. The employer erroneously fails to treat the bonus as compensation for purposes of the plan. This has no effect on the total amount of her after-tax contribution for the year, because her compensation in excess of $345,000 would have been disregarded. However, if the bonus had been taken into consideration, a $2,500 after-tax contribution would have gone into the plan in January, and then contributions would have stopped in late October. Presumably, the employer has no obligation to make a QNEC, because total after-tax contributions for the year would have been correct. However, is it obligated to make up earnings for the period from January 15 through when contributions would otherwise have stopped?

"Rev. Proc. 2021-30 does provide that: 'the Plan Sponsor may treat the date on which the contributions would have been made as the midpoint of the plan year (or the midpoint of the portion of the plan year) for which the failure occurred.' So presumably we could treat the date on which contributions would have been made as July 1, even though we know that they would actually have been made on January 15. But we still have the issue of whether the sponsor is required to make up earnings for the period July 1 through end of October."

"I work for a US-based small business, and we have a wholly-owned French subsidiary. US business is the parent co & pays the US employees, while the French sub pays our French employees. Meanwhile, we also have a few remote individuals in countries like Canada & Portugal, and we use an EOR (Rippling) to pay them. I am looking to set up a 401K for our US employees and speaking to potential plan providers. One plan provider said our structure should present no issues when it comes to controlled groups since any associated rules would only be looking at US employees; however, another provider has been adamant in saying that all non-US employees (French & otherwise) will be included in [DOL] non-discrimination testing due to controlled group rules. If the latter is true, this obviously prevents an issue for us since [1] we cannot actually offer a 401K to non-US employees, and [2] wages are very different across country lines. Can someone please advise?"