Making Life Easier for Retirement Plan Sponsors and Their Participants
How We Do It:
401(k) Specialists is an experienced retirement plan team providing 3(21) and 3(38) advisory and management support for plan sponsors.
We maintain up-to-date knowledge of legal and regulatory issues to keep our clients compliant and protected if audited.
We are able to work with your existing record keeper or TPA, or assist in a review if you’d like to explore potential benefits of changing.
We serve recognizable businesses of all sizes in various industries, many with participants in multiple locations.
We perform participant enrollment and education meetings throughout California in both English and Spanish if requested.
We work to eliminate pain points and elevate every aspect of plan performance for sponsors and their participants.
4 Service Categories:
401(k) Specialists is experienced and fully staffed to provide services covering every facet of retirement plan management. Each of our four Service Categories described below includes specific deliverables critical to maintaining a well-run plan in compliance with the sponsor’s fiduciary responsibilities. While most of our clients contract with 401(k) Specialists to perform all four Categories, we are able to provide individual Categories a la carte. We look forward to discussing your specific needs to offer a recommendation for how we can best serve you.
1. Fiduciary Guidance & Plan-Level Support
Includes 401(k) Specialists working directly with plan trustees and committees to help oversee the plan and make sure it remains aligned with best practices.
- Annual trustee/committee meetings
- Plan governance and fiduciary guidance
- Plan design discussions and recommendations
- Compliance updates (SECURE Act, ERISA changes, etc.)
- Fee benchmarking and vendor negotiations
- Liaising with TPAs and record keepers so the sponsor doesn’t have to manage those conversations alone
- Annual plan reviews with action items and strategic recommendations
- Assistance with plan transitions, Schedule A, IPS/EPS, payroll integration, and overall plan administration support
2. Fiduciary Investment Oversight & Monitoring
Includes 401(k) Specialists monitoring the investment line-up continually to help ensure that participants have a high-quality menu of investments.
- Quarterly Fi360 investment monitoring
- Performance reviews and watch list analysis
- Recommendations for fund changes when appropriate
- Investment Policy Statement (IPS) oversight
- Quarterly investment reports with commentary
- Serving as a 3(21) fiduciary advisor, providing ongoing investment recommendations while the plan sponsor retains responsibility for selecting and replacing investments
- Or serving as a 3(38) investment manager, assuming discretionary responsibility for selecting and replacing investments
3. Participant Enrollment & Education
Includes 401(k) Specialists scheduling and performing enrollment and education meetings to remove this administrative burden from your internal HR team.
- New hire enrollment meetings
- Ongoing enrollment sessions based on eligibility dates
- Group education meetings
- One-on-one meetings after presentations
- Explaining investment options, target date funds, and fees
- Customized agendas based on the plan’s provisions
- Monthly educational communications and ongoing financial education
- Spanish-language education when needed
4. Participant Services & Ongoing Support
Includes 401(k) Specialists serving as primary contact for employees to get their plan-related questions answered, requests handled and problems resolved.
- Assisting with distributions, hardship withdrawals, loans, and rollovers
- Retirement and termination distributions
- Login assistance and account access
- Beneficiary questions
- Balance inquiries
- Completing paperwork and coordinating with TPAs and record keepers
- Following transactions from start to finish and keeping participants informed throughout the process
*Fiduciary services provided for advisory relationships through LPL’s Retirement
Plan Consulting Program.
