Are Defined-Benefit Retirement Plans Better for Small Businesses?

Posted on July 30, 2012 by Tony — No Comments ↓

The Pension Protection Act of 2006 has made is possible for many small business owners to pack 20 years of savings into 10. The regulation changing made make the defined benefit hybrid plans legal and very attractive. Although not for every business or professional firm when these plans work it is a win win for the employer and their employees.

Imagine this scenario: Greg is a 55-year-old client who has owned a highly successful marketing firm for 20 years. He has three employees in their 20s and early 30s who make between $20,000 and $35,000 a year, while Greg takes home $200,000 a year. Greg is looking for a retirement plan that will allow the maximum contribution and provide the biggest tax deduction and savings. Greg has not saved as much for retirement as he would like because his focus has been getting his children through college. He is now ready to contribute as much as possible to a retirement plan, as he wants to retire in the next five to 10 years.How would you advise this client?

While small business owners typically use defined-contribution plans with an elective deferral feature to provide retirement benefits to employees, defined-benefit plans may be ideal for small-business owners over 50 who are interested in saving a substantial amount of money for retirement in a short time period.

Defined-benefit plans promise a specific annual retirement benefit based on the percentage of current income the business owner wants to have at retirement, or the percentage of current income he or she can comfortably afford to contribute, up to an annual maximum of $200,000. These plans are best suited for small business owners who are at least 40, earn $100,000 or more a year, plan to contribute more than $50,000 annually to their retirement and have five or fewer employees.

Sponsoring a defined-benefit plan for employees provides them with a determined monthly benefit upon retirement. Defined-benefit plans can be structured to reward employees who stay with the company while minimizing retirement benefits to those employees with short tenures. Participants are not taxed on the retirement benefit until they actually receive a distribution from the defined-benefit plan. An added benefit to the small business owner is that employer contributions provided to a defined-benefit plan are fully deductible as an ordinary business expense.

When considering sponsoring a defined-benefit plan, small business owners must also consider the costs and expenses associated with operating a defined-benefit plan. Such expenses include:

Funding the defined-benefit plan

Retaining an actuary to determine the amount of the employer contributions

Insurance premiums for the defined-benefit plan if the business has more than 26 employees

However, the advantages of defined-benefit plans often outweigh these expenses for small business owners in their late 40s, early 50s or older who meet the following criteria:

They want to maximize their annual retirement contribution and are seeking the maximum tax deduction

The company has stable cash flow

The company has no employees, few employees or a number of employees who are significantly younger than the owner

via accountingweb.com

Small business and professional service firms have more options when saving for retirement than they are aware of. The Pension Protection Act of 2006 makes the hybrid defined benefit plan a great alternative for many business owners.

Please comment or call to discuss how this affect you and you company.

Posted via email from Curated 401k Plan Content

The Inefficient Retirement Plan Design

Posted on October 26, 2011 by Tony — No Comments ↓

The design of your company qualified retirement plan should be periodically reviewed to assure plan efficiency and compliance with new regulations.

Inefficient plan design wastes money because it either makes less cost effective contributions or it doesn’t maximize tax deductible contributions to highly compensated employees. So it either wastes money in unnecessary contributions or is inefficient for tax savings.In terms of wasting money, it could be a defined benefit plan that has outlived its usefulness or it could be a 401(k) plan with a new comparability plan design and a safe harbor matching contribution (because unlike a safe harbor 3% profit sharing contribution, you cannot use the safe harbor matching to offset any new comparability contributions to non-highly compensated employees like you could with the safe harbor 3% profit sharing contribution). A plan that doesn’t maximize contributions could be a 401(k) plan that consistently fails discrimination testing and doesn’t implement a safe harbor plan design or a plan that doesn’t offer a new comparability profit sharing allocation to highly compensated employees when the plan sponsor can afford it.

Retirement plans are a great employee benefit for retirement savings, but you should never forget the tax savings component it has.

via therosenbaumlawfirm.com

Proper plan design is critical to the success of all qualified retirement plans. If your goal is to attract and retain talented employees a top quality benefit package is necessary.

Please comment or call to discuss how this affects you and your company.

Safe Harbor 401(k) Deadline Looms for Small Business (401kplanadvisors.com)
Help! I Don’t Know What Retirement Plan You’re Talking About! (thesimpledollar.com)
Bucks Blog: Retirement Plan Providers Can Now Offer Own Advice (bucks.blogs.nytimes.com)

Hidden Dangers Of A Retirement Plan That A Plan Sponsor Needs To Prevent

Posted on September 19, 2011 by Tony — No Comments ↓

Employers offering a retirement plan to their employees often treat it as a necessary evil. The 401(k) plan is often the sole source of retirement for most employees. It is time to treat it with the importance of health insurance.

Retirement plans are similar to homes. They also are a cornerstone of the American dream. Retirements plans are generally implemented to save money for employees for their retirement. Like homes, our government encourages retirement savings by offering tax deductions to employers that sponsor and contribute to them while also offering tax deferrals on a participant’s retirement savings until distribution at retirement. The tax benefit comes at a huge cost because the retirement plan must go through important compliance testing so that the plan doesn’t discriminate in favor of highly compensated employees. The problem with retirement plans is that most of the dangers to the plan sponsor as a plan fiduciary are hidden and if the plan sponsor doesn’t surround themselves with the right retirement plan providers, they run the risk of breaching their fiduciary duty. Unfortunately for plan sponsors, they don’t often realize their duties as a plan fiduciary until after they breached them, So this article will try to illustrate the hidden dangers of retirement plan sponsorship and how they can be prevented.

via jdsupra.com

Like your home many of us take for granted the responsibilities of ownership, you must maintain and update over time. With the proper guidance your company retirement plan can help you and your employees to a successful retirement.

Please comment or call to discuss how to be sure your plan is efficient.

Things employers should tell employees about their retirement plan as new participant fee disclosure rules come into effect (401kplanadvisors.com)
Starting A 401(k) Plan: 5 Things You Need To Know (401kplanadvisors.com)
The Next Generation Retirement Plan. (401kplanadvisors.com)