1)Run-it-yourself to save money

You can easily save thousands of dollars -- every year -- by handling your 401k plan's administration in-house. With the Advisors 401(k) system, it's easy -- especially for small and medium-sized companies!

-- The system contains EVERYTHING you need to set up and run your company
401k plan, including your choice of mutual fund investments, customized administration forms and materials, 401k literature for your employees, our easy-to-use administration software, and a comprehensive User's Guide that pulls it all together.

-- The administration software is based on years of professional 401k experience, and is updated every year and is always IRS-savvy.

-- You Pay NO TRUSTEE FEES because Advisors 401(k) plans are IRS-approved to be employer-trusteed. (The IRS has allowed retirement plans to be employer-trusteed
since 1962)

Saving money by running your own 401k plan is great, but only if paying your own people to do the work doesn't eat up all those savings!

-- With Advisors 401(k) you get our years of experience streamlined down to an efficient, effective 401k system that's easy to use and has been designed especially for small and medium-sized companies' self-run 401k plans.

There are no hidden costs or fees with Advisors 401(k), either.

-- You get FREE, UNLIMITED telephone and e-mail technical support  with Advisors 401(k), plus an easy-to-understand User's Guide.

back to Features topics and site menus

7)Run-it-yourself for the versatility of options.

We adopt Advisors 401(k) system to your company's specific needs.

-- Advisors 401(k) works with any of a huge array of SEC-regulated mutual fund families.

-- Advisors 401(k) works with or without employer matching contributions.

-- Advisors 401(k) works for new plans, or for already-existing plans.

-- Advisors 401(k) works with or without 401k loans.

-- Advisors 401(k) works for any number of participants (from one on up!).

-- Advisors 401(k) works with any of today's popular participant eligibility requirements.

-- Advisors 401(k) works with any of today's popular vesting formulas for any employer matching contributions being made.

-- You decide your plan's variables (we'll help you if you wish).

-- We permanently hardwire your decisions into your custom version of Advisors 401(k) software.

-- VIEW PLAN CUSTOMIZATION OPTIONS

You want to offer 401k loans but no matching contributions, or matching contributions but with a stringent vesting formula? How about the investment family you want for your plan? Whatever you want (as long as it's OK with the IRS and the mutual fund company you select), Advisors 401(k) will accommodate. You are never confined by cookie-cutter limitations with Advisors 401(k)!

back to Features topics and site menus

 

2)Run-it-yourself to take operational control.

Run-it-yourself means control: control over the service your plan and its participants receive. Service can make or break your 401k. Because Advisors 401(k) puts you in control, you determine the turnaround times on your employees' requests. You determine any administrative fees you want to establish for fulfilling employee requests, too. (The IRS says you can establish "reasonable" fees to cover certain administrative expenses.)

-- Don't let your employees be herded into a constricting, one-plan-fits-all bundled 401k plan .

-- Don't let your plan be treated as less-important just because it doesn't boast a large asset base.

-- Keep your 401k in-house. By doing things yourself, you bring the quality control in-house -- and save money year after year!

-- Gain freedom from over-charging, under-performing third-party administrators and plan vendors.

-- Gain freedom from outside vendors' schedules and any parameters and limitations they impose on 401k plans to make thing easier on them, but not necessarily easier on you.

With an Advisors 401k plan, you have say over almost everything the IRS normally leaves up to the plan vendors and/or the sponsoring company.

-- Offsite, third-party plan vendors often make decisions based upon what is best and most convenient for THEM, not you or your employees.

-- With Advisors 401k you consider only what's best for YOUR company and its 401k plan.

For instance, you decide how many investments to offer to employees, and what processing fees, if any, to charge plan participants taking out 401k loans, or when and how often participants will be allowed to change their investment choices, or how often to send out participant account statements (Advisors 401(k) makes MONTHLY statements a breeze; with offsite third-party vendors your employees are lucky to get statements quarterly!).

back to Features topics and site menus

 

3)Run-it-yourself for better oversight and security of your plan's assets.

With an Advisors 401(k) run-it-yourself 401k plan, you collect your employees' 401k payroll deductions and send them DIRECTLY to the mutual fund company housing your plan's investments.

-- You never have to worry about human error entering the cycle through the actions or inactions of a third party administrator.

-- You never have to worry about waiting around for a third-party administrator to
receive your payroll data and take care of your 401k processing. With Advisors 401(k),
401k contributions get to the investment phase of the processing cycle more quickly.

-- Advisors 401(k) helps guard and protect plan assets from possible malfiescence by a third party "middleman" or an in-house plan administrator: Theft and larceny by unscrupulous plan administrators of pension contributions is a well publicized problem (published articles and source listings available upon request); the Advisors 401(k) run-it-yourself system helps eliminate the possibility of such a devastating problem, because with an Advisors 401(k) no middleman or third-party ever gets between your employees' contributions and the custodian mutual fund company, for which the contributions are intended.  

In addition, each employee-participant receives a MONTHLY account statement sent directly from the mutual fund investment company housing the participant's 401k savings. These account statements independently confirm and document every monthly purchase and transaction, making it virtually impossible for malfiescence or fraud to go undetected.

-- With Advisors 401(k), third parties NEVER take constructive receipt of any contributions or pension assets at any time.

-- With Advisors 401(k), all transactions are point-to-point, and occur ONLY between your company and the custodian mutual fund company maintaining your plans self-directed accounts, eliminating employees' concerns about the secure and efficient handling of their money.

-- Advisors 401(k) software documents EVERY transaction made, so there's always an easy-to-track and trace audit trail available to your in-house plan administrator and auditor.

back to Features topics and site menus

 

4) EVERYTHING from one reliable source.

"Advisors 401(k)" is an integrated package of products that address all 401k needs, including:

-- the easy-to-use Windows-based Advisors 401(k) plan administration software.

-- the mutual fund families of your choosing.

-- an IRS-approved prototype 401k plan, which we help customize to your company's needs.

-- customized enrollment, participation and employee education forms and materials.

-- the EZFedForms CD-ROM, which contains blank, ready-to-use versions of all 401k-related federal reporting forms (Summary Annual Report, 5500 series, 1099-Rs, and more) as well as annotated versions showing you exactly what information goes where. With EZFedForms, even first-time filings are easy!

-- an educational slide presentation (in convenient video format) for help with explaining 401k plans and their tremendous savings potential to your employees.

-- Three hours of "getting started" technical support while you're getting your plan off the ground.

-- Eight 15-minute blocks of technical support for use at any time during the year.

-- and of course the Advisors 401(k) User's Guide, which explains what to do and how to use Advisors 401(k). All you need to add are the participants!

back to Features topics and site menus

 

9)ERISA 404(c) compliance for 401k plans.


The Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), along with the Internal Revenue Code, sets the legal framework within which all 401k plans must operate. ERISA aims to prevent asset mishandling by administrators, trustees and others. All 401k plans must meet the guidelines set forth in ERISA Section 404(c) regarding educating employees about 401k plans and disclosure of plan and investment-related information to them.

With Advisors 401(k), meeting ERISA 404(c) requirements is easy:

-- Advisors 401(k) software permanently logs all employees' requests for information.

-- Your plan can offer an exceedingly wide array of mutual fund investments options.

-- Plan participants receive monthly account statements from both the Advisors 401(k) system and the mutual fund companies housing plan investments. 

-- Your plan's participants can change their investment choices and/or contribution levels as often as you allow.

-- Participants' accounts receive daily asset valuation, and MONTHLY statements.

-- Participants have 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week access to their personal account information and easy access to prospectuses for all mutual funds offered within the plan.

-- Advisors 401(k) comes with plan-specific disclosure materials for your employees.

-- Advisors 401(k) comes with general 401k and investment education materials  in both printed and video format for your employees.

-- Advisors 401(k) automatically prepares and updates account statements for each participant every month (and prepares mailing labels that make distributing statements a breeze).

-- The 401(k) User's Guide tells you what information to distribute when, and to whom.

back to Features topics and site menus

 

5) Run-it-yourself shortens the time between payroll deduction and intended investment.

With a typical out-sourced 401k plan you are required by the third-party administrator to compile the exact same data that Advisors 401(k) asks for.

-- Why go through the time and trouble of sending the data you compiled offsite to a third party for processing when, with a few clicks of your mouse, you can do all the processing in-house! With Advisors 401(k), you enter the data, then click "Process."
-- Within seconds the software processes, cross-references and records all the  employee and employer contribution information.

-- The software prepares MONTHLY STATEMENTS for each of your employees so each knows how much money has been added to his or her 401k account.

-- The software prepares instructions telling you how much money to forward to the mutual fund company and/or participant-directed brokerage accounts housing your plan's investments.

-- The software prepares purchase orders to forward to the mutual fund company, instructing them exactly how much money goes into each participant's individual, personal self-directed account.

With many typical third-party out-sourced 401k plans...

-- you are required to forward payroll and contributions data to the third party administrator, then

-- wait for the third party administrator to process the information [possibly via a software program similar to Advisors 401(k)!], then

-- wait for the third party administrator to transfer the contributions to the appropriate investment custodians, and

-- wait for the investment purchases to be made, then

-- hope the third party administrator is handling your employees' money in a careful and workmanlike manner, then

-- wait for employee statements to arrive, wait for distributions, wait for compliance test results,  wait for answers to your routine questions, wait.... wait....wait ....

The Advisors 401(k) software and companion materials condense and simplify 401k administration. The system is built on years of hands-on experience -- experience building and maintaining popular 401k plans used by small and mid-sized businesses across the nation!

-- You save time -- which IS money -- by using an Advisors 401(k) run-it-yourself 401k system!

 

back to Features topics and site menus

 

9)Advisors 401(k) knows the rules and regulations.


Advisors 401(k) is IRS-savvy -- and built to stay that way. Many pertinent Internal Revenue Code regulations and guidelines are written into your Advisors 401(k) software.

-- The Advisors 401(k) software warns you against IRS infractions, such as excess contributions, or compliance problems, saving you from headaches and extra work at year's end. Lawmakers modify 401k rules and regulations every year, so we update the Advisors 401k system every year.
-- We keep abreast of 401k regulatory changes so you don't have to.

-- We update the Advisors 401k software as well as all the companion materials (including the comprehensive EZ-FedForms CD-ROM) each year in light of regulatory changes.

-- The Advisors 401k software only accepts 401k data pertaining to the tax year for which the software was written, so you'll never accidentally operate your plan under the wrong year's regulations.

back to Features topics and site menus

 

10)Technical Support: we're always ready to help!

Advisors 401(k) tech support is always close at hand. It covers everything from technical, software-related issues to marketing your plan to your employees and holding successful plan enrollment meetings.

-- Every Advisors 401(k) plan comes with FREE, UNLIMITED telephone and e-mail technical support.

-- VIEW TECHNICAL SUPPORT SPECIFICS.

Every Advisors 401(k) system also comes with a comprehensive yet easy-to-use User's Guide that explains your 401k responsibilities and how to use the Advisors 401(k) system to fulfill them -- quickly and efficiently.

back to Features topics and site menus

 

12)You're never locked in to the run-it-yourself arrangement.

If your company already has a 401k plan and is interested in changing over to a run-it-yourself arrangement, we will help with the conversion. Likewise, if your company decides to abandon 401 (k) Easy's run-it-yourself arrangement and convert to a outside administered plan, we will assist in the conversion as well.

-- We can quickly convert nearly any existing 401k plan into an Advisors 401(k) run-it-yourself arrangement. You may even be able to keep your current investments line-up!

-- We can quickly convert any Advisors 401(k) run-it-yourself 401k plan into a full-service plan, too, if you ever see the need.

-- A full-service plan can be very affordable (although not as affordable as the run-it-yourself arrangement) even for a small company if you hire Pension Service Associates to run the plan for you. They're the small and medium-sized plan specialists!

If your company grows by leaps and bounds and you decide you'd rather pay someone else to do the 401k work. We will recommend the best full-service alternative and assist with the conversion.

back to Features topics and site menus

 

home | features and benefits | investments | free 401k software download | pricing | to order | contact us

 in brief | tour | frequently-asked questions | $-back guarantee | plan options | converting existing plans | tech support |
ERISA 404c compliance | full-service plans | 401k basics | about us | press room | links | business alliance programs | site map | 401k glossary

mutual funds investments Class A mutual funds | Class B mutual funds | Class C mutual funds

© 2008 Pension Systems Corporation. All rights reserved. Legal notices.