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May 7, 2021 In NWPS News

NWPS Adds to Its Business Development Team with Industry Professional Mike Cohen AIF

NWPS is pleased to announce the appointment of Mike Cohen as Director of Advisor Relations. Mr. Cohen comes to NWPS with over 15 years of retirement industry experience having held senior positions with Charles Schwab Trust Bank, The Standard and TRI-AD. In this newly created role, Mike will focus on managing NWPS’ strategic relationships including with leading wirehouses, independents, RIAs, money managers and custodians. “Mike’s extensive experience working with retirement plan professionals and home office leaders makes him uniquely qualified to serve as a resource for our business partners and their clients,” remarked Tim Wulfekuhle, President & CEO of NWPS. “He is an authentic, seasoned relationship manger and we are thrilled to welcome Mike to our team.” Mike received his bachelor’s degree from the University of Colorado. He holds the FINRA Series 7 and 63 licenses and is an Accredited Investment Fiduciary with Fi360.

January 14, 2021 In 401(k), Advisors, Fiduciary, Participant, Participant Data, Recordkeepers

Recordkeeper consolidation may be coming, but don’t squeeze the participant!

The idea that a recordkeeper should “monetize” participants is appalling. George and Abigail Revoir of AMRev Consulting, writing in the November 4th 2020 edition of RPA Convergence opine on recordkeeper consolidation and the ever widening gap between mega and midsize providers. No question there is revenue pressure in our business, but one comment in their otherwise satisfactory analysis of this trend stopped us in our tracks. The end game, says the Revoirs, is to “monetize the participants.” Monetize the participants? How appalling! What plan sponsor wants to hear that in a “finals” presentation! “Mr. Plan Sponsor, we offer X, Y and Z services, but what we’re really after is access to your employees to upsell them non-plan related products and services.” Which CFO is OK providing 100% of employees’ personally identifiable information to an organization that will use it to “monetize” her employees? Be assured, it is quite possible to profitably serve plan sponsors and their participants with accurate, responsive and innovate recordkeeping without having to view participants as piggy banks. NWPS has been doing it for 26 years and we are certainly not the only ones. And let’s not forget the current discussion over who really owns the participant data

December 17, 2020 In Culture, Life, Recordkeepers, Service Model

Just Say No – to Silos

Why intelligent minds like Steve Jobs and Elon Musk reject silos. NWPS competes with the largest of 401(k) vendors. We frequently go up against Vanguard, Fidelity, Empower and the others. While there are many facets to our story, a differentiating one is that NWPS does not have departments or “silos” for different processes (e.g. the document department, the compliance group, the year-end services division, the distribution unit). Rather, each client is assigned a dedicated team with a lead consultant responsible for all aspects of plan operations. There are no silos at NWPS with robotic employees performing repetitive tasks. It has been this way since our founding in 1994. Little did we know that Steve Jobs and Elon Musk have publicly endorsed our service model! Writing for Inc.com, author and leadership expert Justin Bariso recounts how both Jobs and Musk rejected silos that “create an us vs. them mentality.” The cost of this divisive model increases as a company grows. In an organization with functional silos, each department has its own set of success metrics, often not aligned with other departments. Each silo ends up attempting to curry the favor of management by hitting their own goals, frequently at the expense

October 27, 2020 In Benefit Limits, IRS, Retirement Plan Contributions

New Dollar Limits Applicable to Qualified Plans Released

The IRS issued new dollar limitations that are applicable to qualified retirement plans for plan years beginning in 2021 (except for the 401(k) deferral limit and Catch-Up Contribution limit, which apply on a calendar year basis). Some of the most commonly noted limitations are as follows: The limit on contributions by employees who participate in 401(k)s, 403(b)s, most 457 plans and the federal government’s Thrift Savings Plan remains unchanged at $19,500. The catch-up contribution limit for employees age 50 and older who participate in these plans remains unchanged at $6,500. The limitation for defined contribution (DC) plans under Section 415(c)(1)(A) (annual additions) has been increased for 2021 to $58,000 from $57,000. The limitation used in the definition of “highly compensated employee” under Section 414(q)(1)(B) remains unchanged at $130,000. The limitation on the annual benefit under a defined benefit plan under Section 415(b)(1)(A) remains unchanged at $230,000.   Details on these and other retirement-related cost-of-living adjustments for 2021 can be found here, and are in IRS Notice 2020-79.

September 23, 2020 In Advisors, Fees, Fiduciary, Lawsuits

Avoiding ERISA Lawsuits Isn’t Hard

Proposed class action lawsuits by retirement plan participants against their own employers are on track for a fivefold increase between last year and this year, according to a Bloomberg Law analysis. Sixty-five class action suits have been filed so far in 2020 and many of these suits are for excessive fees and/or the use of overpriced share classes. Several employers have been sued multiple times (e.g. Quest Diagnostics, Cerner Corp, Omnicom Group). Startlingly, some of the employers are large money management and plan recordkeeping firms (e.g. INVESCO, Goldman Sachs, BlackRock, Mutual of Omaha, Fidelity – multiple times). Talk about a fox guarding the hen house!Moreover, these lawsuits are being brought against smaller plans (e.g. Greystar Management Services - $188M plan) and to other participant driven plans like 403(b)s (e.g. Mercy Health, University of Miami). After all, ERISA and the duty to pay only reasonable fees applies equally to qualified plans of all sizes and flavors. Sure, many of these lawsuits can be explained by the fact that the case law is maturing (providing a blue print for action) and that participants are more knowledgeable and attuned to fees now that the expense curtain has been pulled back somewhat. Today, there

August 5, 2020 In NWPS News

NWPS Hires Shanley Johndrow as Vice President of Client Services

July 13, 2020 - SEATTLE, WA. (BUSINESS WIRE)—NWPS announced today that Shanley Johndrow has been hired as Vice President of Client Services for the Mill Creek, WA office. Johndrow will be responsible for developing and leading a team of dedicated retirement plan professionals who work directly with plan sponsors, advisors and attorneys to provide high touch, consultative, reliable service. Johndrow joins NWPS with more than 30 years of retirement plan experience with Standard Retirement Services and predecessor companies. Most recently Johndrow served as AVP, Plan Services for The Standard. “I am excited to welcome Shanley to the team,” said Tim Wulfekuhle, President and CEO of NWPS. “She adds leadership depth to our Mill Creek Office and management team as a whole and brings a wealth of retirement plan, customer relations and management experience to her role at NWPS. Johndrow holds a B.S. in Business Administration from University of Washington and is FINRA licensed.   About NWPS NWPS was founded in 1994 to provide high-quality service to retirement plan sponsors and advisors. Specifically, we provide comprehensive retirement plan administration, recordkeeping, compliance and participant services. We also provide consulting, employee communication and actuarial services to the sponsors of retirement, health and welfare, and financial security programs. For

March 23, 2020 In Life, NWPS News, Participant, Recordkeepers, Uncategorized

NWPS COVID-19 Update

First and foremost, our thoughts and prayers are with the individuals and families most affected by the COVID-19 outbreak, and our profound gratitude goes out to the medical first responders and the every-day, hard-working Americans who are delivering our food, stocking the shelves and manning the gas stations. At NWPS, we take our responsibilities to our clients, plan participants, and staff very seriously. During this COVID-19 pandemic, our top priority is keeping everyone on our team healthy so they can continue to perform their jobs while doing our civic duty to help slow the pace of infection. With that in mind, we have implemented a plan that ensures, from your perspective and the perspective of your plan participants, it will be business as usual, and we are committed to keeping the quality of our services and our responsiveness at the level you expect from us. Rest assured that contributions are being processed, phones are being answered and distribution checks are being sent. Because of our careful planning, we are confident we have the infrastructure and processes in place to be successful. We will keep you posted as new events develop, but in the meantime, don’t hesitate to reach out to us if

March 2, 2020 In 401(k), Cross Selling, Fiduciary, Participant Data, Recordkeepers

The Value of Participant Data

In the tech world, there is an old saying: “if the product is free, you’re not the customer; you’re the product.”  Turns out this was first presented as a concept regarding the relationship between TV networks and viewers way back in 1973.  It’s as true now as it was then! What does this have to do with retirement plans you might ask.  Well, in several recent ERISA lawsuits the use of participant data by a plan’s provider to cross-sell other products and services has been raised as an ERISA violation both by the plan sponsor and by the providers.  To wit: “Even worse,” the lawsuit states, “Shell defendants allowed the Fidelity defendants to use plan participants’ highly confidential data, including Social Security numbers, financial assets, investment choices and years of investment history to aggressively market lucrative non-plan retail financial products and services, which enriched Fidelity defendants at the expense of participants’ retirement security.” We thought it would be interesting to consider the enterprise value of participant data by making some comparisons with the tech and social media giants.  In 2015 a tech blog published these numbers (market capitalization/monthly average user count).  We calculated the 2020 numbers (with some difficulty!). Value of a User 2015 2020 Facebook $158 $246 Google $182 $500 Alibaba $621 $850 Amazon $733 $3,500 What the table