"I had a 401(k) that I terminated on 4/15/2020. I was the only participant. I rolled everything to my IRA. I filed the final 5500-SF return. I shut down my business on 9/15/2021 and retired! Yay! I'm sitting here minding my own business and an envelope arrives from Schwab. It's a statement with a Statement Period July 1, 2020-March 31, 2025 showing that an old investment paid out a settlement of $95. I had to call to get a check issued because I haven't had online access to that account since 2020. OK, now I have the check. I'm going to deposit it. I just don't know where (IRA, personal account?) and how much paperwork has to be generated. If it's too big of a hassle, I was thinking I'd just rip up the check, but the account would be open (maybe) forevermore. What to do, what to do."

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"For the 2022 Plan Year, ADP testing was completed and refunds were issued in March 2023. The participants received 1099-R's in January '24. It was later discovered the ADP test was run incorrectly, and approx. 10 HCE's received too much in refunds. A handful of those HCE's have since terminated employment. This is a large Plan that is audited. How (if at all) can this be corrected? I doubt any of the terminated participants would want to re-deposit the money into the Plan. Would the employer make a QNEC of the amounts refunded in error to those still in the Plan?"

"We have a new client that is a partnership. There is one partner who also has a corporation that is an affiliated service group member that has adopted the 401(k) plan of the partnership. Proceeds from the partnership flow through to his corporation and he receives a W-2 from that corporation along with a K-1 from the partnership. This partner's K-1 has $500,000 in box 1, but $0 in box 14. The CPA for the partnership is insisting that box 1 from the K-1 should be used as his earned income for plan purposes -- not box 14. This partner has a small W-2 and no 401(k) withholdings listed in box 12 -- both of which would be problems unless K-1 box 1 is used as his plan compensation. I was always taught to use box 14 from the K-1 as the earned income figure (which is then reduced for 50% FICA....) to determine plan compensation. Is this correct or should box 1 of the K-1 be used as the CPA suggests?"

"Imagine your client's retirement plan provides on severance-from-employment an involuntary distribution of a participant's account no more than $7,000, accepts rollover-in contributions, and otherwise is eligible for the auto-portability network the plan's recordkeeper offers. Imagine your client asks for your advice about whether to approve auto-portability. And your client specifically asks for your advice not about what's best for participants, but rather about what's most risk-avoiding for the fiduciary. What responsibility and potential liability might a fiduciary face because it approved auto-portability? What responsibility and potential liability might a fiduciary face because it did not adopt auto-portability? How do you advise your client?"