Defined contribution plan consulting
Defined Contribution Plan Consulting
In today’s ever-changing workplace, defined contribution (DC) plan design is no longer an issue that arises every five or 10 years. It needs constant attention and fine tuning. Changing corporate objectives, shifting workforce demographics, cost pressures, recruiting and retention needs, mergers and acquisitions, and unexpected events all must be considered to optimize plan outcomes.
Consulting services
Maximize the value of your retirement program with creative solutions that align to your corporate culture and long-term goals, backed by in-depth analysis and decades of Milliman expertise. Our expert consultants don’t put your business in a box. They tailor plan designs to ensure they are competitive and aligned with your goals. Then, they continuously monitor performance to ensure your unique goals are met.
- Plan design: Clarify your goals, get insights from your data, and get a complete custom plan design with innovative features to meet the unique needs of your business.
- Compliance: Ensure compliance with the Department of Labor (DOL) and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) regulations and protect your business with appropriate discrimination testing and fiduciary and compliance documents.
- Fee analysis: Save money with in-depth analysis of vendors’ fees and revenue sharing agreements, including investment management fees and participant- and employer-paid fees.
- Participant success: Understand participants’ retirement readiness and help them achieve healthy financial outcomes through plan design and proactive engagement. Your people will know exactly where they stand today and what they need to do to achieve success.
- Benchmarking: Benchmark your plan against peers, the market, and your industry. You’ll receive internal and external survey results to help you evaluate and improve the effectiveness of your retirement program.
- Mergers & acquisition assistance: Gain tools and training to assess your retirement plan needs in the event of a merger, acquisition, or divestiture. Services include pre-merger analysis, current plan analysis and comparison, benefit design, communication consulting, plan changes, and testing.
Employee-centric strategies for overcoming staffing challenges and boosting retirement savings
A manufacturing client has a low participation rate in its 401(k) plan, with more than half of its employees choosing not to participate. As a result, it has problems passing nondiscrimination testing each year. Highly compensated employees (HCEs) have expressed their desire to defer what they want and not have deferrals returned due to failed nondiscrimination tests.
Plan design changes boost participant and deferral rates
Our client’s goal was to have an A+ plan with respect to participation and retirement readiness. Milliman’s relationship manager/consultant guided the plan committee through the steps to implement automatic enrollment, automatic increase, and a re-enrollment strategy. Consulting included plan design, industry practices, cost analysis, and operational considerations. The result? A 94% participation rate with an average deferral rate of 9.0%.
Plan design and new plan addition creates significant cost savings
A restaurant-industry client was experiencing low participation and high plan costs. The company was incurring significant costs related to the 98.8% of eligible hourly eligible employees who were not in the plan. Milliman’s relationship manager/consultant helped redesign the plan by redefining eligible employees as salaried employees and corporate hourly employees, and adding a nonqualified plan for highly compensated employees. The redirected cost was used to fund the matching contribution in the nonqualified plan. The result? A $260,000 cost reduction.
Related defined contribution plan consulting services
Related defined contribution plan consulting products
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