Quick Facts
What Causes A Problem in Benefit Plans?
Approximately three out of every four Department of Labor (DOL) investigations are conducted on organizations using an employee benefit plan auditor that audits three or less plans per year. One of the contributing factors to this problem is there are about 10,000 CPA firms that audit employee benefit plans. Of those firms, 85% of them audit five or less plans. About 50% of the 10,000 firms only audit one plan every year. It’s considered to be off-season work so many firms use this as “filler” and bid it out at low cost.
How Will the DOL Increase Controls?
The DOL has stated that it intends to increase its scrutiny of firms conducting only a few audits. While that is one strategy, the true way to fix the problem is for companies to stop using firms that only have a few benefit plan audit clients. This will cut down on the increasing error rate the DOL is seeing, but of greater benefit to the company using this type of auditor it will:
- Minimize the potential for a DOL investigation
- Avoid DOL penalties and interest charges
- Ensure your benefit plans are being properly managed
Why Samuel Goldstein & Co.?
- Over 20 benefit plan audit clients
- Clients just over the audit requirement threshold to ones with 10,000 plus participants
- Members of the AICPA Employee Benefit Plan Audit Quality Center
- Members of the International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans
- We offer competitive fees due to the efficiencies gained from conducting a larger number of plan audits
Minimize Your Risk
Organizations need to understand that acquiring the cheapest plan auditor is not necessarily a great achievement. It’s the reason why plan audit violations are not dropping. We are a reasonable, cost-effective firm that will maintain expenses, but also provide the quality audit you need.