Making Sense of Retirement Plan Layers and Complexities
I had posted in an earlier blog some of the technical differences between 401(k) plans and 403(b) plans. One of the more striking differences I did NOT mention was that of the Prohibited Transaction.
Assume a successful insurance agent sits on the Board of a mid-sized tax exempt organization with 250 employees, a Board which…
403(b) devotees often speak of the continuing, and significant, number of technical differences between 403(b) and 401(k) plans. The following lists a few of the differences not given a lot of attention, a sort of holiday stocking stuffer:
Handling 403(b) cash. Handling cash is much more challenging under a 403(b) plan than under…
This where the PBGC, the NIRS and Pension Rights Center (which also presented at the conference) have it all wrong: the traditional DB plan does not, and will not, meet these laudable goal if you rely upon the private employer for the financial wherewithal to insure that the funding will be adequate, and that plan sponsor’s own corporate financial needs have not caused some sort dangerous “creative accounting” in the management of these plans which we have all too often seen in the past.
Continue Reading Continuing the DB Demise Discussion
The real key to making the FAB work for the employer in keeping auditing costs down is in the sensible application of the FAB’s 3rd condition. I would suggest that applying it consists of two parts. First, use a reasonable effort to determine and find contracts that were related to the plan at some time in the past and, secondly, making a reasonable effort to determine whether or not the rights under those contracts are “legally enforceable” by the individual.
Continue Reading Using the Third Condition of DOL’s FAB 2009-2 to Manage 403(b) Audit Expense