After many rounds of negotiations, Congress passed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act on December 20th, 2017.  Though retirement plan limit reductions were included in many iterations of the bill, the ultimate effect on qualified plans was relatively minimal.  

Millennials. You may have noticed them around the office. You might think of them as the lazy, flighty, entitled generation born between the early 80's and 00's that say "totes" when they agree with you. Like any group of misplaced stereotypes, not all is as it appears when it comes to the younger contingent and, since they are taking over as the largest sector of the workforce, you may want to take a second look at them as adults, assets, and major contributors to your company's retirement plan.

As the year-end approaches, our to-do lists can be lengthy. There are holidays to prepare for, employee performance reviews to complete, and, oh, wait, there is also the year-end data collection package from your TPA! 

Times can get tough for people. With the onset of Hurricane Harvey having decimated parts of the Gulf Coast and Hurricane Irma following its destructive lead, we are reminded that at any point we may find ourselves in hardship.

There has been much upheaval in the retirement world as of late and it centers around the new fiduciary rule. The New Fiduciary Rule means that many investment professionals that weren't previously considered fiduciaries will now have to take on that role. So, why is that such a bad thing? Well, it's not per se, but the implications of how this may change the way the investors and their companies function may leave them frustrated and tentative towards some future business. But before we get too bent out of shape, let's break it down and see what we're truly looking at.

For many years, plan sponsors have wrestled with the decision to offer loans to their plan participants. Some consider them to be a benefit and even promote them as a legal way to use tax free money while participating in the plan. According to the Employee Benefit Research Institute, 87% of plan participants can take a loan against their retirement account. Of those employees with access to take a loan, about one-fifth borrow against the retirement account. Come retirement, what are the effects of loans taken from pension funds on an employee's account?

Whether it’s your car, your air conditioning or your own health, virtually everything you depend on in life needs a periodic assessment. What’s working, what needs repair? A company’s retirement plan is no different. And the evaluation is no less complex than the one your primary care physician might use.

Over the last 30 years, there's been an incredible array of advancements in technology that have impacted various parts of our lives. While not all of them were amazing, many of them inherently improved our quality of life and some allowed us to catapult forward into a world of instantly accessible information on a scale never witnessed. As computer science has seeped into almost every facet of life, there's been an increase in connectivity, productivity, and efficiency.

How much of your life happens online—75 percent? 90? With cell phones in our pockets and tablets next to our beds, we’re all leading electronic lives, with the expectation that when we want or need information, we’ll find it almost immediately. And retirement plan information is no different.

Every plan sponsor has a fiduciary responsibility to account for all funds in a retirement plan—including uncashed distribution checks. Do you know what your responsibilities are when a check goes uncashed or a plan participant falls off the grid? Is there a point at which you are no longer liable?