Employers are now preparing for benefits enrollment season, and chances are likely that you’ll soon experience an uptick in potential clients who want to set up new health savings accounts (HSAs) for next year.
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You’ve established your retirement plan. Contributions are coming in and distributions are going out. Everything seems to be running smoothly . . . until your recordkeeper sends an alert indicating that you may not be operating your plan according to all the terms of the document.
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Beneficiaries are allowed to disclaim inherited IRA assets. But beneficiaries cannot direct where the assets will go.
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With the passing of key retirement legislation in the last few years, there are many incentives for employers to adopt a qualified retirement plan that can provide meaningful benefits to employees. While there are numerous factors to consider during the establishment process, employers should consider certain effective dates that will significantly affect the success of their plan’s initial year of operation.
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Summer is typically a slower part of the year for most financial organizations, so organizations often use this “downtime” to review their operational policies and procedures. During this time of the year, our consultants on the Ascensus 800 Consulting Lines receive frequent calls about IRA record retention—including “How long should our financial organization keep IRA documents?”
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When individuals retire or leave their employer, they must decide what to do with the accumulated savings in their retirement plan. Typically, they will roll over the assets to another qualified retirement plan or an IRA in order to keep the assets in a tax-deferred account. If they decide to withdraw the assets, they may end up having to include the distribution amount in their taxable income for the year.
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Health savings accounts (HSAs) continue to grow in popularity. And as they become more popular, you should expect an increase in HSA-related questions from clients. This article provides answers to some of the more common HSA questions that your clients may have.
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Certain events in the life of a retirement plan may lead to some assets being temporarily allocated to special unallocated accounts, rather than being credited to a specific plan participant. This is the case with both forfeiture accounts and suspense accounts, which—perhaps not surprisingly—are sometimes confused with one another.
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The IRS on July 14, 2023, issued Notice 2023-54 to provide transition relief for required minimum distributions (RMDs) in connection with the change in required beginning date (RBD) to age 73 under SECURE 2.0, and guidance for certain specified RMDs for 2023.
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The SECURE 2.0 Act of 2022 (SECURE 2.0) provisions affecting the Employee Plans Compliance Resolution System (EPCRS) support the IRS trend toward shifting certain types of retirement account corrections to the Self Correction Program (SCP).
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Financial organizations sometimes have a difficult time tracking down beneficiaries that are entitled to inherited IRA assets. Some scenarios may have you questioning, what do we do with these assets now?
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The coronavirus pandemic resulted in restrictions on where and how people could meet. These limitations—including remote work requirements—made it harder for some participants to take distributions from employer-sponsored retirement plans. In response, the IRS issued temporary relief allowing spousal consent to be obtained using remote notary services.
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Here are answers to some of the common Coverdell ESA questions we receive from financial organizations.
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SECURE 2.0 is the hot topic in the retirement industry right now and has been hailed as the most important retirement enhancement legislation in more than a decade. One of the changes effective for plan years beginning after December 31, 2023, reforms the family attribution rules by redefining “employer” for qualified retirement plan (QRP) purposes.
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The SECURE 2.0 Act has added several more penalty-free distribution options—including one that helps individuals pay for certain emergency expenses.
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The SECURE 2.0 Act provides more ways for individuals to access their retirement savings and creates new exceptions to the 10 percent early distribution penalty tax.
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The IRS in late May 2023 issued Notice 2023-43 to address questions and provide interim guidance related to Section 305 of SECURE 2.0.
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There can be confusion surrounding how to report SEP contributions. Our ERISA consultants receive frequent calls about this topic on our 800 Consulting lines. A common scenario involves a self-employed business owner receiving a Form 5498, IRA Contribution Information, and noticing that the SEP contribution that he made wasn’t reported for the tax year in which he reported the contribution on his federal tax return.
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