Media Coverage

Industry-led auto-portability network ready

Pensions & Investments Washington reporter Brian Croce covers the official October 2023 "go live" date for auto portability, via the industry-led Portability Services Network, and presents a uniformly positive view of the industry network, as well as the go-forward prospects for auto portability. Croce includes extensive quotes from key representatives of the consortium, including Fidelity's Dave Gray, Alight's Greg Long, Vanguard's Steve Holman, as well as RCH's Spencer Williams and Neal Ringquist. Croce also turns to industry voices, including PSCA's Executive Director Will Hansen and EBRI's Craig Copeland.

A ‘Slam Dunk’: 401(k) Auto-Portability Network Nears Live Date

PlanAdviser's Alex Ortolani covers the impending "live" date for auto portability, as delivered by the Portability Services Network, and turns to RCH's Spencer Williams and Neal Ringquist for their views. RCH has been working towards the debut "for about 10 years", writes Ortolani, which Williams refers to as "the long road, the hard road, and [we] have arrived at a spot that is, frankly, not only the best solution, but has promise of being even better.” RCH's Ringquist adds color on the cutover, speaking to the "staggered start" for recordkeepers and addressing the solid business case for moving small-balance accounts forward within the plan system.

Safeguarding Retirement Savings: Inside Secure Act 2.0 Key Priorities

BDO Alliance USA, among the industry’s largest associations of accounting and professional service firms, evaluates key priorities contained within recent SECURE 2.0 legislation, and includes an analysis of Section 120 of the act, which addresses auto portability. The piece notes that the auto portability "provision enhances portability by allowing the plan sponsor to now transfer the former employee’s default IRA assets (established at termination) into the participant’s new employer’s plan. The provision both curtails asset leakage from ERISA plans and helps alleviates the missing participant issue." The article also notes a related provision of the legislation -- Section 304 -- that increases the dollar limit for plan sponsors to automatically cash out a former employee’s retirement plan from $5,000 to $7,000, starting in 2024.

How Auto-Portability Works

Featured in the 'Upfront' section of PLANSPONSOR's September-October magazine edition, Ed McCarthy performs a deep dive examination of auto portability, which McCarthy notes, has "has gained momentum in the past few years, culminating in the 2022 formation of the Portability Services Network, a company owned jointly by RCH and several of the largest U.S. recordkeepers." For details, McCarthy turns to RCH's Spencer Williams and Neal Ringquist, who opine on the technical details, while Vanguard's Steve Holman, a PSN Board member, offers the recordkeeping perspective.

Leveraging SECURE 2.0 to Earn More 401(k) Business

Writing in NAPA Net, 401(k) Marketing's founder & CMO Rebecca Hourihan offers tips to plan advisors on how they can leverage awareness of SECURE 2.0 provisions to update plan fiduciaries and earn more 401(k) business. Hourihan focuses on components of SECURE 2.0 that deal with small account balances, including an increase to allowable safe harbor IRA balances and auto portability, as delivered by "a network of recordkeepers." Hourihan suggests that advisors "discuss the benefits of adding....auto-portability to plans now" and comes down firmly on the side of plan-to-plan consolidation, counseling advisors "to help employees consolidate accounts and encourage more assets into the plan" by incorporating "strong calls-to-action during enrollment and education meetings."

401(k) Megatrends Set to Boost Retirement Savings

SHRM's Stephen Miller, CEBS, writing in SHRM's HR Today Magazine, examines "technological breakthroughs, red-tape-cutting legislation and new initiatives from service providers" that will dramatically -- and positively -- impact 401(k) and other defined contribution plans in the years to come. Miller identifies auto portability as one of four "megatrends" that will ensure small-balance accounts are not left behind, noting the emergence of the Portability Services Network, identifying auto portability's strong support from research institutions & legislators, and quoting industry experts, such as RCH's EVP Neal Ringquist and Alight Solutions' EVP Alison Borland.

Focus Shifts to Plan Sponsors as Portability Network Set to Go Live

Writing in 401k Specialist, RCH's Tom Hawkins describes the coming "shift" that will occur when the Portability Services Network (PSN) goes live at the beginning of the fourth quarter of 2023. Describing PSN's network-building achievements to date as "nothing short of phenomenal", Hawkins adds that "integration had proceeded apace" and that "plan sponsors will take center stage as they begin to adopt auto portability and witness its tangible results." Plan sponsor adoption will accelerate as auto portability demonstrates its obvious benefits to plans, to participants and to society at large, where adoption will eventually serve as a "positive indicator of a socially responsible enterprise."

Previously featured in RCH's Consolidation Corner

A Perfect Storm is Brewing—But Automated Portability Could Defuse It

RCH and PSN President & CEO Spencer Williams, writing in the Consolidation Corner blog, notes that a rising incidence of hardship withdrawals and 401(k) loans – as reported by Bank of America – combined with a pending increase in the account-balance limit for automatic rollovers effective 12/31/23, could create a “perfect storm” for depleting Americans’ retirement savings. “Fortunately,” writes Williams, “sponsors and recordkeepers have access to a solution that can help them clean up their plans without automatically rolling terminated accounts into safe-harbor IRAs.” Auto portability, continues Williams, is a “capability [that] is more essential than ever, with 401(k) plan enrollment continuing to increase” and could serve to defuse the brewing storm of potential cash-outs.