BENEFITS DIGEST

The Retirement Learning Center addresses what happens to outstanding 401(k) loan balances when employees arrive through a merger or acquisition, a recurring administration question in deal integration.

An opinion piece examines how frequent job changes expose participants to what the author calls plan churn, the accumulation of small accounts, cash-outs, and lost momentum that follows each move between employer plans, and argues the problem deserves more attention from plan sponsors and recordkeepers than it gets.

Under current rollover regulations, plan administrators may prescribe any reasonable procedure for a distributee to elect a direct rollover and may impose reasonable requirements for a distributee to provide information or documentation to facilitate the rollover.

Section 324 of the SECURE 2.0 Act directs Treasury to issue sample forms, procedures, and protocols that make rollovers easier to complete and more consistent across plans.

Milliman reviews the IRS's recent communications on direct rollovers for qualified DB and DC plans, with recommendations, procedures, and next steps for plan sponsors.

The IRS recently released Notice 2026-49, proposing sample forms and a standardized five-step process for rollovers to eligible retirement plans under Section 324 of the SECURE 2.0 Act.

New guide addresses a CFP professional’s fiduciary obligations when providing financial advice on whether to roll over assets from an employer plan.

Retirement plan sponsors should be aware of a new rollover process proposed by the IRS pursuant to Notice 2026-49 (the “Notice”) intended to streamline the process of direct rollovers to or from a retirement plan.

With the mandatory Roth catch-up regime live for participants who earned over $150,000 in prior-year FICA wages, Lyndsey Barnett walks through the correction framework when a high earner's catch-up contributions land pre-tax by mistake. Timing matters: errors caught before W-2 filing are fixed by transferring the funds and correcting wage reporting, later discoveries require an in-plan Roth rollover with 2026 errors corrected by December 31, 2027, and no correction is generally required if the erroneous amount is $250 or less.

PLANADVISER's take on Wednesday's rollover guidance, which led yesterday's Digest: electronic transfers and standardized forms for moving retirement savings between plans would be encouraged under the proposed procedures.

A second read on the SECURE 2.0 section 324 rollover package, with attention to the four sample forms and what recordkeepers will need to change to support direct electronic transfers.

NAPA's advisor-facing angle on the same guidance: what standardized rollover procedures would mean for plan-to-plan transfers and the participants who currently abandon rollovers midway.

relevant context for rollover conversations.

and why plan sponsors should treat cross-selling as a fiduciary-oversight item.

Implementing SECURE 2.0 section 324, the IRS proposes four optional sample forms and standardized procedures for rollovers between employer plans or between a plan and an IRA, aiming to replace today's paper-check-and-fax friction with a predictable process. Use of the forms would be optional and no safe harbor attaches yet; comments are due October 23, 2026.

PLANSPONSOR's coverage of Notice 2026-49: new guidance would encourage electronic transfers and standardized forms for moving retirement savings between plans.

Questions of portability and flexibility for both plan sponsors and participants can impede adding guaranteed retirement income offerings.

until now.

Portability Services Network’s Steve Holman separates fact from fiction by addressing five common misconceptions.

The two partners will develop a model that “can serve as a centralized channel for secure data integration and transactions,” to reduce operational hurdles