Frequently Asked Questions
Vanguard and Ascensus have a longstanding relationship working with employers to help employees prepare for retirement. Ascensus has deep retirement expertise and tools to keep pace with changing regulations and designed for participants in small business plans.
Ascensus will act as a recordkeeping provider and Ascensus Trust will be the custodian for your Individual(k) plan.
Ascensus Trust will act as custodian for your SEP or SIMPLE IRA plan.
About Ascensus
Ascensus has been serving small business owners and their employees for more than 40 years and is the largest independent recordkeeping services provider in the country – with over $760 billion in savings assets under administration, and more than 5,400 associates. In the retirement business, Ascensus currently serves 154,000+ retirement plans and more than 4.8 million participants.
Vanguard and Ascensus have a longstanding relationship working with employers to help employees prepare for retirement. Ascensus has deep retirement expertise—and tools to keep pace with changing regulations and designed for participants in small business plans.
Ascensus will act as a recordkeeping provider and Ascensus Trust will be the custodian for your Individual(k) plan.
Ascensus Trust will act as custodian for your SEP or SIMPLE IRA plan.
Contact Ascensus Monday through Friday, from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. ET.
- SEP and SIMPLE IRA plan sponsors: 833-889-4554
- SEP and SIMPLE IRA participants: 833-889-9878
- Individual(k): 833-688-0086
Fees
- $20 annual fee per participant for trust and custody services.
- Account service fees will be $25 per mutual fund for SIMPLE IRAs and $20 per fund for Individual(k) and SEP IRAs, which is the same as fees assessed by Vanguard.
- Participants who fully liquidate their account with Ascensus after January 1, 2025, will be assessed a one-time $25 fee (no fees will be assessed for partial distributions).
- Any exceptions or waivers of account service fees provided by Vanguard will no longer apply.
All fees will continue to be automatically deducted from participant accounts in November, as of October 31 of that year.
Vanguard mutual funds have embedded investment management fees. Please review the prospectus available on vanguard.com to see specific details.
Account information
You will continue to have access to a diverse lineup of Vanguard mutual funds after the transition to Ascensus. Any investments you have at the time of the transfer that are not included in the standard list of available funds will be transferred to Ascensus and will still be available to you.
Your account was transferred "in kind," which simply means your assets were never out of the market and there was no change to where your existing dollars were invested.
As a plan sponsor, you can look forward to continuous innovation with benefits including:
- A streamlined contribution experience
- The ability to set a contribution election once and have it automatically invested into your specified investment elections (Individual(k) plans only)
- Expanded communications and eDelivery solutions
- A specialized team that exclusively supports your specific plan type
In addition to having access to similar features and functionality participants valued with their Vanguard experience, they will also have:
- Access to READYSAVETM app
- Ability to see contributions broken out by source
- Flexible eDelivery options
From Vanguard
- Confirmation of your Vanguard Individual(k), SEP or SIMPLE IRA account transfer to Ascensus
- Final statement based on your regular statement frequency
From Ascensus
- You will receive your first statement from Ascensus in October 2024 and receive future statements quarterly.
Your plan ID number changed with the transition to Ascensus. Plan sponsors will be provided with the new plan ID after the transition.
Successor Plan Administrator – I(k) only
If you pass away, this is the person who will provide us with instruction on how to distribute your account. We ask that you complete the Designation of Successor Plan Administrator/Trustee – Individual (k) form, sign as Plan Administrator/Trustee, and return it to us. The person you designate as Successor Plan Administrator/Trustee does NOT need to sign this form. If we do not receive this form, please see section 2.01(b) of the Recordkeeping Services Agreement for who will be deemed successor plan administrator.
Complete the form, sign, and return by email to requests@ascensus.com. The person you designate as Successor Plan Administrator/Trustee does NOT need to sign this form.
Beneficiaries
All participants need to designate beneficiaries on their account because all prior designations were not transitioned to Ascensus. Participants will receive a communication from Ascensus reminding them to register for account access on the employee website and update this information. If needed, Vanguard will provide Ascensus with any beneficiary information on file until November 30, 2024. After that date, if beneficiary designation(s) have not been made on the Ascensus employee website, the election will automatically default to "Estate."
You can designate individual(s), a trust, or estate and should have the applicable information readily available:
- Individuals: name, date of birth and Social Security number (address is optional)
- Trust/Entity: name of trust or entity and Employer Identification Number (EIN)
- Estate: name of estate
Contributions
Plan sponsors can continue to submit payroll contributions as they did at Vanguard. The experience may be slightly different, but we’re taking great care to keep the process simple and streamlined.
“How-to” guides and short videos
Making contributions
Resources to walk you through the process.
SEP and SIMPLE IRA plans:
Watch short video
Download "how-to" guide
Individual(k)TM plans:
Watch short video
Download "how-to" guide
All fund allocations must follow the same fund selection for each source. Future investments will follow the direction established for pre-tax contributions. If you do not have fund allocations set for pre-tax, we will use your Roth or after-tax fund allocations for any future contributions. This does not affect how your current balance is invested.
For Example:
|
Fund |
Current Pre-tax Allocations |
Current After-tax Allocations |
Future Pre-tax Allocations |
Future After-tax Allocations |
|
A |
20% |
|
20% |
20% |
|
B |
20% |
|
20% |
20% |
|
C |
|
50% |
|
|
|
D |
60% |
|
60% |
60% |
|
E |
|
50% |
|
|
Last updated 07/17/2024