Art of the Qualified Plan Audit

A member of our Employee Benefit Plan Audit Team, Stacey I. Snyder, CPA, will be speaking in an upcoming Strafford live webinar, “Mastering Form 5500 Schedule: Avoiding Audit Triggers” scheduled for Thursday, May 18, 1:00pm-2:50pm EDT.

It has been almost two years since the DOL released the results of its study of the quality of work performed by independent qualified public accountants (IQPAs).

Administrative simplicity or empathy for participants in need? Allowing more than one participant loan in a retirement plan is not a black and white determination.

Keeping two sets of books often means that someone is hiding something from the taxing authorities.

Pre-tax contributions to a 401(k) or 403(b) plan are not taxed when made to the plan but are taxed when the participant receives a distribution of the contributions.

When it comes to IRS audits, “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” as Benjamin Franklin so wisely put it.

In the retirement plan industry, 2 + 2 can be 4, or many other amounts depending on the actuarial assumptions used. Similarly, one-participant plans can actually cover hundreds of participants.

Posted by Maria T. Hurd, CPA Disclaimer: All blog posts are valid as of the date published. In a highly regulated industry with complicated rules that always have exceptions (except when the exception does not apply) it is inevitable that sooner or later a failure to follow the plan document will take place. Such operational … Continued

One of the most common operational errors when administering retirement plans is the failure to implement a participant’s elective deferral election or change in percentage.

Prospective clients often want to see a sample information request letter to get a better idea of how an audit will progress. In response to that frequently asked question, we created a white paper to assist clients in preparing for their retirement plan audits.