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Hidden within the Setting Every Community Up for Retirement Enhancement Act (SECURE Act) signed into law last December is a provision giving businesses extra time to establish certain new tax-qualified retirement plans. Prior to the SECURE Act, a new workplace plan had to be adopted by the last day of the employer’s tax year. Despite that deadline for adopting a new plan, businesses were always allowed extra time to make retroactive employer contributions for any year (including the plan’s first year). The employer contribution deadline is the due date (including extensions) of the company’s federal tax return.

Last year the SECURE Act became law and eliminated the stretch IRA for millions of IRA beneficiaries. However, for some IRA beneficiaries the stretch lives on. For most beneficiaries, the stretch is now replaced with a ten-year payout period. Beginning for deaths in 2020, the ten-year rule will apply to designated beneficiaries who are not eligible designated beneficiaries under the SECURE Act. Eligible designated beneficiaries include spouses, minor children of the IRA owner, chronically ill and disabled individuals and beneficiaries who are not more than ten years younger than the IRA owner.

A financial advisor contacted me about her client who had recently passed away. The advisor was legitimately concerned about a rollover check received by the now-deceased individual. It had not been deposited into his IRA prior to death. Was her client’s estate stuck with a taxable distribution? Could the financial institution refuse the rollover because the person was no longer of this earth?

It happens. You have made a 2019 contribution to the wrong type of IRA. All is not lost. That contribution can be recharacterized. While recharacterization of Roth IRA conversions was eliminated by the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, recharacterization of IRA contributions is still available and can be helpful in many situations. Maybe you contributed to a traditional IRA and later discovered the contribution was not deductible. Or maybe you contributed to a Roth IRA, not knowing that your income was above the limits for eligibility.

The IRA and plan rollover rules have been in constant flux this year. We are now past the original July 15 extended rollover deadline. This was the first extension date created by IRS Notice 2020-23. Distributions from an IRA or company plan taken February 1 or later could have been rolled back to an IRA or company plan beyond the standard 60-day rollover window. This rule applied to any distributions that were otherwise eligible to be rolled over, including unwanted RMDs.

The countdown to the much delayed 2019 tax filing deadline is on. The deadline is July 15, 2020, which is only a couple of days away. Time is running out. Is your IRA ready? Making Your 2019 IRA Contribution Due to the COVID-19 pandemic the 2019 tax-filing deadline has been extended until July 15, 2020. This means that July 15, 2020 is also the deadline for making a 2019 IRA contribution. This is true even if you have an extension to file your tax return. An extension does NOT give you extra time to make a traditional or Roth IRA contribution. So, if you are thinking about making a 2019 contribution, the clock is ticking.

There’s been a flurry of recent government regulation of company retirement plans. Here’s a quick summary: Electronic Disclosure of Retirement Plan Documents On May 27, 2020, the Department of Labor published a final regulation making it easier for employers to issue retirement plan notices to participants electronically. Notices can be posted on a website or mobile app or delivered via email. Employees who prefer hard copies can opt out of electronic delivery and receive paper disclosures instead.

IRAs are supposed to be for saving for retirement but in challenging economic times like these many individuals may be forced to take distributions before retirement age. Be careful! If you tap your IRA before reaching age 59 ½, the bad news is that you run the risk of being hit with the 10% early distribution penalty. The good news is that there are some exceptions to this penalty. You IRA distribution will still most likely be fully taxable, but you can spare yourself the additional 10% penalty if one of these exceptions apply to you.

After a six-month sprint through a diabolical obstacle course of new laws, a pandemic, record unemployment, deaths, confusion and complete disruption of everyone’s professional and personal lives, this seems like a good time to recap the madness of the pr

Question: Hi Ed, If a person takes that 100k distribution, can they elect to split evenly in 2020-2022 as income? Or can they determine how to apply the income? Shannon Answer: Hi Shannon, Those persons who qualify for up to $100,000 of 2020 coronavirus-related distribution (not everyone does) can spread out income evenly over their 2020-2022 tax returns.