WORKFLOW LIBRARY · DEADLINE MANAGEMENT
A 401(k) compliance calendar for TPAs that tracks every plan.
How to track regulatory deadlines plan by plan across plan years, organize them into views your team actually uses, assign ownership, and tie each deadline to the annual administration work that satisfies it.
WHY THIS STAGE MATTERS
Missed deadlines are the most avoidable plan failures.
A TPA with fifty plans is managing hundreds of dated obligations a year: census requests, contribution calculations, testing corrections, excess deferral refunds, Form 5500 filings, extensions, and participant notices. Each plan can have a different plan year end, and each obligation depends on work finishing earlier in the year. A generic office calendar or a spreadsheet of standard dates breaks down quickly once plan years differ and staff change.
The cost of a miss is concrete. An ADP/ACP corrective distribution made after the 2½-month window triggers a 10% employer excise tax. A late Form 5500 can bring penalties. A 402(g) refund after April 15 creates tax complications for the participant. None of these are hard to prevent if the deadline is visible, owned, and linked to the task that satisfies it.
| Deadline | General rule | Calendar-year plan |
|---|---|---|
| ADP/ACP corrective distribution (no excise tax) | Within 2½ months after plan year end | Mid-March |
| ADP/ACP correction generally required | Within 12 months after plan year end | December 31 of the following year |
| 402(g) excess deferral refund | Generally by April 15 of the following year | April 15 |
| Form 5500 | Last day of the 7th month after plan year end | July 31 |
| Form 5500 with Form 5558 extension | Extended by 2½ months | Mid-October |
| Deposit of participant contributions | As soon as reasonably segregable, no later than the 15th business day of the following month (7-business-day safe harbor for plans under 100 participants) | Every payroll |
Dates that fall on a weekend or holiday may shift. Confirm current IRS and DOL rules for each plan.
STEP-BY-STEP PROCESS
Building and running the calendar in six steps.
Start from each plan's data, not a template
Generate deadlines from each plan's plan year end, plan type, and features. A safe harbor 401(k), a traditional 401(k), and a cash balance plan carry different obligations. A cash balance plan, for example, has no ADP/ACP correction deadline, but it does need an employer contribution calculation.
Cover prior, current, and next plan years
At any point in time, a TPA is closing out last year (testing corrections, Form 5500), operating the current year (deposits, mid-year checks), and preparing for next year (notices, plan changes). The calendar should show all three, labeled by plan year, so a March deadline is never confused with the prior March.
Categorize every deadline
Group deadlines into a small set of categories, such as Filing, Testing, Contribution, Notice, and Data. Categories let a compliance analyst filter to testing work or a consultant check filings across their book.
Assign an owner
Every plan should have a responsible consultant, and that person owns its deadlines. Filtering the calendar by consultant gives each person a personal worklist and gives the operations lead a way to spot overloaded staff.
Work from three views
Most teams need three questions answered every morning: what is overdue, what is due in the next 30 days, and what is due in the next 90 days. Overdue items should always appear regardless of the date range selected. A count of deadlines completed this year shows progress through the season.
Link deadlines to project tasks
A deadline is satisfied by work: the Form 5500 filing deadline by the "File Form 5500" task in that plan's annual administration project. Linking the two means that when a task slips, the deadline it threatens is obvious, and when the task completes, the deadline can be marked done.
COMMON EXCEPTIONS
Where calendars go wrong.
Non-calendar plan years
A plan with a June 30 year end has a Form 5500 due January 31. Calendars built from "standard dates" get these wrong. Always compute from the plan year end.
Extensions filed but not recorded
When a Form 5558 is filed, update the deadline to the extended date and keep the original visible. Otherwise the item shows as overdue, or worse, the extended date is forgotten.
Stale overdue items
A long overdue list that nobody trusts gets ignored. Close items when the work is done, and investigate anything genuinely late the same week.
Consultant turnover
When a consultant leaves, reassign their plans and deadlines on day one. Filter by the departing person to confirm nothing is left unowned.
Treat the overdue count as a health metric. If it grows during testing season, it is a staffing signal, not just a scheduling one.
CONTROLS AND EVIDENCE
Proof that deadlines were met.
Controls
- Deadlines generated from plan data, reviewed when plan provisions change
- Every deadline has an owner
- Weekly review of overdue and 30-day items
- Extensions recorded with the filed date
- Deadlines linked to the project tasks that satisfy them
Evidence to retain
- Completion date for each deadline
- Filing acknowledgments and extension confirmations
- Dates corrective distributions and refunds were processed
- Notice delivery records
- The project checklist showing who completed each task
IN THE PILOT BUILD
How the KinetiPlan pilot build supports this.
The Compliance Calendar in the pilot build tracks regulatory deadlines for every plan across prior, current, and next plan years. It runs on synthetic demo data.
- Summary counts for Overdue, Due in 30 Days, Due in 90 Days, and Done This Year.
- List and month views, with date ranges from the next 30 days to the next 12 months, and overdue items always shown.
- Filters by category (Filing, Testing, Contribution, Notice, Data), by consultant, and an option to include completed deadlines.
- Each row shows the date, deadline, plan year, sponsor, consultant, plan, category, status, days overdue or remaining, and the linked annual administration project.
- Deadlines include year-end census requests, employer contribution calculation targets, ADP/ACP corrective distribution deadlines, 402(g) excess deferral refunds, and Form 5500 / 8955-SSA due dates.
- A Subscribe / download .ics option so deadlines can appear in your own calendar app.
- Annual administration projects follow a 10-step checklist from census request to Form 5500 filing via EFAST2, with a board view by status.
See the screens on the pilot build tour.
REGULATORY TASK
Automated required minimum distribution (RMD) alerts
Required minimum distributions are a participant-level deadline that a plan-level calendar can miss. An automated RMD alert should look at each participant's age, employment status and balance, apply the plan document and current IRS rules, and raise the alert early enough for the participant to be contacted.
- Not in the pilot build today: KinetiPlan does not generate RMD alerts or calculate RMD amounts.
- Why it fits: the participant census in the pilot build already holds age, status (active or terminated) and account balance, and the compliance calendar already tracks dated, owned deadlines. An RMD alert rule is a candidate for pilot scope, defined against your plan documents.
REGULATORY TASK
Force-out processing for terminated participants
Small balances left by terminated participants add cost, missing-participant risk and administrative load every year. Force-out processing for terminated participants means finding balances under the plan's cash-out threshold, sending the required notices, waiting the notice period and then paying or rolling over according to the participant's election or the plan's default.
- Not in the pilot build today: there is no force-out workflow, notice generation or rollover processing. KinetiPlan does not move money.
- What the pilot build does show: terminated participants and their balances on each plan's census, which can be exported to CSV, and distributions recorded as a transaction type on the ledger.
- Proposed for pilot scope: a force-out project template with dated, assigned steps on the same compliance calendar, set up from your plan document's terms.
FAQ
Common questions
When is Form 5500 due for a 401(k) plan?
Form 5500 is due by the last day of the 7th month after the plan year ends, which is July 31 for a calendar-year plan. Filing Form 5558 extends the deadline by 2½ months. Confirm current DOL and IRS rules.
Why should a TPA compliance calendar be built per plan?
Plans have different plan year ends, plan types, and features, so the same obligation lands on different dates. Computing deadlines from each plan's own data avoids errors that come from copying a standard calendar-year schedule.
Which views matter most on a compliance calendar?
Most teams work from three: overdue items, items due in the next 30 days, and items due in the next 90 days. Filters by category and by consultant turn those views into personal worklists.
Can the KinetiPlan pilot build send deadlines to Outlook or Google Calendar?
The pilot build offers a Subscribe / download .ics option, a standard calendar format that most calendar apps can import or subscribe to.
This guide is general educational information about retirement plan operations, not legal, tax, or investment advice. Confirm current IRS and DOL rules and the terms of each plan document before acting.
SEE IT ON YOUR OWN WORKFLOW
Walk through the compliance calendar in the pilot build.
We will show overdue and upcoming deadlines across plans, filter by consultant, and follow a deadline to the project task that satisfies it.