What is a fiduciary operations assessment?
An operations assessment is an evaluation of an employee benefit plan’s conformance to fiduciary rules. It’s more than just a review of best practices, though. Authentic assessments are conducted by a certified governance, risk and compliance (GRC) expert certified by OCEG that specializes in employee benefit plans.
Assessments identify gaps between real world benefit plan operations and fiduciary rules.
The Assessment Rating
A Roland|Criss fiduciary operations assessment produces the Qualified Plan Review Rating. The QPR Rating™ is a management tool used by employee benefit plan committees to make continuous improvements in their practices and to prove their conformance to mirky regulations. The rating also helps cut CPA’s plan auditing costs, leads to lower plan fees, readies the plan for a surprise audit by the Department of Labor, and in unbiased terms reveals how well vendors perform.
Steps in a Fiduciary Operations Assessment
- verify that a retirement plan’s operations adhere to its policies;
- test for deficiencies that may have been caused by payroll errors;
- examine control procedures and update them to meet Department of Labor standards;
- test the reasonableness of service providers’ fees;
- exploit the value of the plan’s assets in order to lower administrative and investment costs paid by plan participants;
- test for conflicts of interest;
- identify opportunities for improvement in all four fiduciary disciplines (governance, administration, investments, and controls);
- deliver a current state update for inclusion in the enterprise’s risk management program;
- add clarity to the relationship between a plan sponsor and the plan’s vendors; and
- fees should be scaled to fit a plan’s size and complexity.
Want a demonstration of how a fiduciary operations assessment works?
QPR Rating™ is a trademark of Roland|Criss
