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Plan Sponsors Expanding Their Efforts
Participants’ retirement security remains the priority of plan sponsors—and they are boosting their work to enhance it, says a recent report. JP Morgan, in its fifth Defined Contribution Plan Sponsor Survey, which provides the results of an online survey of 788 sponsors of 401(k) and 403(b) plans during the period Jan. 9-Feb. 28, 2023, looks at... Read More >>
Plan Sponsors: How to Win the War for Talent
Retirement plan advisors are busy helping their plan sponsor clients (and participants) sift through the 92 mandatory and optional provisions in SECURE 2.0, especially highlighting those most pressing in 2024. One generating interest (if not the most interest) is the student loan matching program. It permits employers to match student loan... Read More >>
'Guiding' Student Loan Matches
One of the optional provisions in the SECURE 2.0 Act that some employers were very excited about is the provision to allow a 401(k) match based on a participant’s student loan payment rather than deferrals. This was seen by many as a way to help young (or not so young) employees start saving for retirement while paying off loans as student loan... Read More >>
Success Is Not Enough
The U.S. retirement system is a success—but we still can do better. That was the message from an expert panel that recently examined the gaps in that system and made suggestions regarding how to fill them. Pete Swisher, Managing Partner at Group Plan Systems, and Annie Messer, President, Member Relations at Pension Resource Institute and Group... Read More >>
Matching Deferral Rates?
Sponsored by: MFS Investment Management Once a plan sponsor decides to use an automatic enrollment feature, they must decide a few other items – default rate, default investment option, whether to auto-escalate. Though the default investment option is most commonly a target date fund (85% of plans*), and two-thirds of plans automatically... Read More >>
IRS Posts Initial Employer Guidance on Emergency Savings Accounts
The IRS has issued initial guidance to help employers with implementation of pension-linked emergency savings accounts (PLESAs). Authorized under the SECURE 2.0 Act of 2022, PLESAs are individual accounts in defined contribution plans—designed to permit and encourage employees to save for financial emergencies. However, the IRS acknowledges that... Read More >>
DOL Fiduciary Rulemaking a ‘Solution in Search of a Problem’: Hearing
With several references made to the movie Groundhog Day, witnesses testifying at a House subcommittee hearing to examine the DOL’s proposed investment advice fiduciary rule suggested the proposal goes beyond its legal authority and called on Congress to act before the guidance ends up in litigation. “I’ve been pushing back against this misguided... Read More >>
Big Names Back Latest Proposed Fiduciary Rule
While many financial services firms and related trade groups have expressed their opposition, several high-profile firms have come out in support of the latest iteration of the Department of Labor’s (DOL) proposed fiduciary rule, officially known as the "Retirement Security Rule: Definition of an Investment Advice Fiduciary." According to the... Read More >>
DOL Files Suit for Failure to Remit Retirement Plan Contributions
The Department of Labor (DOL) has filed two lawsuits against two defunct Maryland companies for failure to remit employer and employee contributions to their 401(k)s. Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su filed a lawsuit on Jan. 8 after an investigation by the Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) found Elkridge, Maryland-based Jones Dykstra... Read More >>
Plan Sponsors Can’t File Form 5558 Electronically Until 2025
Plan sponsors will not be able to file the Form 5558, Application for Extension of Time to File Certain Employee Plan Returns, electronically through the Department of Labor’s (DOL) EFAST-2 system until Jan. 1, 2025. The IRS on Jan. 5, 2024 updated its website to state that it is postponing electronic filing of the Form 5558. The IRS attributes... Read More >>