"For us, it's about teamwork. By demystifying the obscure, we empower our clients and their advisors to make their benefits programs more effective."


Compliance And Correction

IRS And DOL Voluntary Compliance Programs
At Chang, Ruthenberg & Long, we believe that there are at least five good reasons to assess your plan for compliance and make voluntary corrections. Consider the facts:

  • Someday, the IRS will audit your plan.
  • What you don't know CAN hurt. Ignorance may be bliss, but it's not cheaper. Problems are easier - and less expensive - to fix when they're small and relatively recent.
  • Change happens, and as for the laws governing retirement plans, change happens frequently. A simple Baseline Check-Up of your plan documents by trained ERISA professionals can reveal plan failures that day-to-day administrators don't see.
  • It's the right thing to do. Plan participants expect their retirement plans to deliver what's promised. Mistakes in plan operation can devastate employee morale.
  • IRS and DOL retirement plan correction programs are there to help. There's also help for plan operation problems that can't be self-corrected but that are voluntarily identified.

Chang, Ruthenberg & Long attorneys such as Marcel Weiland have extensive experience and a proven record of success with both the IRS's Employee Plans Compliance Resolution System (EPCRS) and the DOL's Delinquent Filer Voluntary Compliance (DFVC) Program.

Retirement Plan Baseline Check-Up
Our Baseline Check-Up of your plan documents can provide early detection to keep potential problems from becoming costly fiduciary liabilities and penalties. What signals tell you that it's time for a plan check-up? Take the Baseline Check-Up Quiz - five self-evaluation questions - to learn if it is.

We'll work directly with your recordkeeper. In connection with your business structure, we'll review plan and trust documents, administrative forms, participant benefit statements, payroll records, Forms 5500, summary annual reports, audit reports, compliance tests, employee census data, and ERISA bonds.

Once the review is complete, we'll prepare a report of our findings. If problems are found, we'll priortize them in order of severity and explain ways in which we can help you bring non-compliant items into compliance - retroactively and prospectively - using one of the government's self-correction programs.