What is a Pooled Employer Retirement Plan? Who can benefit from joining one? Find out from our brief video below that provides an overview of this type of retirement vehicle.
Summary:
Pooled Employer Retirement Plans allow unrelated employers to band together, under a single retirement plan, to offer cost-efficient and effective retirement benefits to their employees.
Delve into the intricacies of Pooled Employer Retirement Plans and highlight their transformative potential. From understanding what they are to identifying who stands to gain the most from joining one, we hope this video offers valuable insights into this innovative retirement plan. As retirement forecasting continues to evolve, Pooled Employer Retirement Plans emerge as a powerful tool for both employers and employees seeking robust and efficient retirement solutions.
Advantages:
- Fee reduction (25-50% savings in many cases),
- Reduced fiduciary responsibilities due to professional management,
- Time and administrative savings for plan sponsors.
Disadvantages:
- Streamlined administration might limit customization, e.g., on loans and hardship withdrawals,
- Transitioning to a PEP involves an initial blackout period.
Transcript:
[Michael] “Hey everyone my name is Michael Clark managing director at Agilis based out of Denver Colorado. I’m joined by agilis’s Chief Executive Officer Tom casara and today we wanted to talk briefly about pooled employer plans Tom what is a pooled employer plan?”
[Tom] “A pool deployer plan is a defined contribution where 401k plan that is established by a professional group that’s going to oversee all elements of the 401K design
[Michael] “So are these new? How come we haven’t heard of these before?”
[Tom] “So the quick answer to your question Michael is no they are not quite new but what has happened is that the secures act effective in 2021 allowed plan sponsors who otherwise aren’t in the same line of business to come together to be able to share resources and to join into a PEP plant so the marketplace for perhaps has has opened widely effective 2021 and now that’s become the popularity of the pep plants”
[Michael] “All right so if companies are coming together pooling resources there’s got to be some advantages there. What are some of the advantages for a company that is looking to join a pooled employer plan?”
[Tom] “There are many advantages in fact I tend to think of it as three main advantages:
- The first is fee reduction because of being able to pull resources and have more assets at work along with you know streamlining some of the the benefits we’re able to save money in fact for for many plans we see 25 to 50 percent of savings as compared to their current costs.
- Second is fiduciary savings because these plans are professionally managed by an outside organization who’s taking on that liability there is less for the plan sponsor to oversee and to be responsible for in terms of fiduciary responsibility. Doesn’t go to zero, but it gets greatly reduced in what you do from quarter to quarter gets greatly reduced .
- The third is the time and effort by the the plant sponsor themselves because those those a lot of the administration is now going to be outsourced and things like an audit is no longer a responsibility of those of the plant sponsor there are many less steps for the plan sponsor to oversee and to do so there’s there’s once again fiduciary savings fee savings and Time and expense Savings”
[Michael] “So that that sounds all good right but like with anything there’s got to be some disadvantages that companies are going to want to weigh against these advantages. What are those disadvantages?”
[Tom] “I would say there’s two buckets of disadvantages. The first bucket would be just that with the professionally managed and Outsourcing there’s gonna be certain elements that they’re going to want to streamline mostly around Administration but mostly around the secondary decisions of the administration. So the primary part of a plant design is typically the formula itself in terms of the match as well as the the a profit sharing that you may want to contribute those you’ll still be able to retain but items like loans and hardship withdrawals and items like that those are going to be streamlined across the entire PEP. So that will be the one that surveyors. The second disadvantage if you were to choose a pup it’s like any any other Record Keeper change you’re gonna you’re gonna have to go through that blackout period um it’s just the initial Contracting and the blackout period to make a change but that was a normal course of business if any change.”
[Michael] “So I mean it sounds like there’s a lot for plan sponsors to weigh here right? The advantages sound great in terms of fee savings reducing fiduciary risk and less time and effort that they as a company have to put into managing and administering a plan. Some disadvantages as you’ve mentioned some of those one-time disadvantages like a transition so who should be looking at pooled employer plans as a potential program for their retirement benefits?
[Tom] “Personally I think every plant sponsor should at least evaluate whether or not a pooled employer plan makes sense. As a fiduciary it’s your responsibility to see if there is a better option for your participants but what we’ve found in our experience is that those plans that are probably less than 200 million of assets are going to pick up all three buckets of those advantages. They’re going to see those those fee savings, and then get the reduced time and expense savings, as well as the fiduciary savings the larger plans will get the last two typically of the savings
[Michael] “Excellent Tom thanks for this um everyone else we want to invite you June 6th put that on your calendar we’ll be sending out invites for an in-depth webinar that where we’ll be discussing pooled employer plans in great detail come see if they’re right for you until next time thanks everyone”
