13-Point Service Plan

401(k) Specialists

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Fiduciary Services

Running a business means you probably wear a lot of hats. Maintaining the legal fiduciary responsibilities associated with your company’s retirement plan takes continual learning, resources and time you might like to devote elsewhere. Yet your fiduciary role poses a significant amount of personal risk. Let Thiesen Dueker’s 401(k) Specialists help. Through our independent guidance and monitoring, our fiduciary oversight program offers significant protection for your plan’s management team – and specifically, for you. We invite you to take advantage of the following fiduciary services*:

  1. Development of an Investment Policy Statement
  2. Benchmarking investment provider fees and expenses
  3. Training of investment committee members regarding duties and obligations
  4. Investment analytics which tie directly to the threshold established in the Investment Policy Statement
  5. Investment committee guidance to prudently select and monitor investment options
  6. Documentation processes, including corporate minutes and maintaining an internal control file
  7. Electronic backup of ongoing plan-related documentation
  8. Detailed employee communication calendar
    *Fiduciary services provided for advisory relationships through LPL’s Retirement Plan Consulting Program

Other Key Compliance Services:

The Department of Labor expects plan sponsors to be able to demonstrate competent plan oversight in all areas. 401(k) Specialists provides the expertise and personnel to help you meet these requirements. Click on any of the following services for more information.

Thiesen Dueker Group will be your outsource partner in the plan provider review process. We use the PATHFINDER Plan Provider Review Process and Brightscope Score to eliminate the confusion of selecting a 401(k) plan provider and offer true apples-to-apples comparisons. We will greatly reduce the amount of time you would invest to evaluate plan providers if you were to handle this process yourself. More importantly, we are able to look beyond the face of sometimes-inadequate provider proposals to determine for you if necessary fiduciary elements are included.

As you may know, over the last decade, Congress has burdened corporate retirement plan sponsors with an overwhelming volume of legislation. To remain compliant and protected from reprisal, continual review of your retirement plan is vital. While legislation dictates uniformity for some plan features, recent changes in the laws are aimed at increasing employee participation and requiring plan sponsors to restore certain benefits and incentives. First and foremost, Thiesen Dueker Group knows the law regarding corporate retirement plans and knows how to keep your plan compliant. We will work directly with your plan’s service providers to ensure the following key components:

  • Increased employee deferral limits and employee tax credit incentives
  • Online participant access for account balance inquiry and changes
  • Key personnel access to plan and participant data
  • Paperless enrollment
  • Electronic transmittal of payroll, loan and distribution transactions
  • Automatic enrollment/negative election
  • Optimum frequency and educational content of employee communications
  • Complying with 404 (c) investment guidelines and requirements
  • Proper conversion/transition process

Your corporate investment plan must undergo regular analysis to document compliance with Department of Labor guidelines and minimize your exposure to fiduciary liability. Even in volatile market cycles, you are expected to demonstrate that your plan’s investments are diversified, well managed and meet the stated objected set forth in your Investment Policy Statement. Thiesen Dueker Group will work with your retirement plan committee to create your Investment Policy Statement and provide the ongoing, comprehensive investment analysis to ensure your fiduciary compliance. We use multiple tools, including some of the most robust investment analytical systems available. We will evaluate each investment by more than a dozen objective measurements, including:

  • Upside & Downside Capture
  • Style: Correlation and Style Drift
  • Performance: Excess Return & Tracking Error
  • Risk-Return: Standard Deviation, R-squared, Alpha, Beta & Sharpe Ratio

Industry retirement experts suggest that most of us will require at least 80% of our pre-retirement income to maintain our current standard of living while in retirement. Yet with qualified plans and Social Security alone, you and your key executive team members could receive as little as 30% of your current income when you retire. Business owners and key employees are finding it more difficult to adequately save for retirement because qualified retirement plans, group insurance plans and even Social Security place limits on contributions, layouts and tax advantages of benefits for highly paid employees. As part of our corporate retirement plan services, Thiesen Dueker Group will offer strategies and options to help you and your executive team overcome these limits and realize the retirement income you envision.

An ongoing employee communication program is critical to the success of your retirement plan. When your employees have a clear understanding of the benefit, they can more confidently participate in the retirement plan and have a greater appreciation for it as part of their total benefits package. We tailor our Communications Plan to your specific corporate structure and culture. Communications Plan: Our first step is to develop a written service calendar based on agreed expectations, values, goals and success parameters. Once the plan is in place, our team will handle all the execution details. You’ll then have a valuable tool that incorporates an understanding of behavioral finance, evaluates employee demographics and considers plan usage trends to identify opportunities for improvement.

Coaching: There is no substitute for personalized, professional advice. Thiesen Dueker Group’s experienced consultants will be available for onsite group meetings and one-to-one financial counseling. We’ll provide your employees the information they need to take an active role in their financial futures. Following are key components of the Communications Strategy:

  • Pre-enrollment coordination and communications
  • Payroll stuffers, post cards, targeted communications
  • On-site meetings conducted by experienced registered advisors
  • Multi-lingual representatives and materials as required
  • Video and teleconference capabilities for remote locations
  • Access to online investment and financial planning resources

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