Although retirement is a life event that most workers look forward to with great anticipation, unfortunately a large number of people do not prepare sufficiently for it. The right retirement plan offered by employers can help to ensure their workers are adequately prepared and ready for this life-changing event.

Finding the right plan can be a challenge and even overwhelming for many employees; and employee retirement services have been designed specifically to help your employees in this process.

Helping to make sure that each employee is completely prepared for their future is the focus of this service.

They handle all of the details of your company’s plan, working with business 401(k) providers, taking care of all the ins and outs so that you don’t have to.

These professionals will help you to work out your matching contributions to the employee’s plan, and will take care of the employee’s money, creating a schedule that works for everyone involved.

In addition to this, the retirement plan provider will help you to fully understand the rules, regulations and any fees that are associated with retirement. This makes a topic that can be overwhelming and complex much easier and simpler to manage.

You will find a selection of articles sharing information on retirement options and plans on this site, along with the top three retirement plan services: Paychex; Fidelity Investments; and ADP.

What To Look For In An Employee Retirement Service

When considering different employee retirement services, it is important to take into account customer support, knowledge and experience, and variety.

You will want a company that has an excellent track record, provides a choice of plan options and that provides exceptional customer service.

In addition to these criteria, check that the companies you are considering are willing to work with the size of business you have, and that they provide options for maintaining your plans as well as creating them.

Details To Look For In Retirement Plan Services

Plan Creation

Apart from checking that the retirement plan providers you are looking at offer the type of plans you have decided you want, it is also important to make sure that their enrollment is easy and simply for your employees.

A great addition is the participant and employer website. This enable your employees to stay on track for retirement more easily, allowing them to view critical information about their plans.

Since many of your employees may already have retirement plans, it is a good idea to look for a service that provides roll over plans since these allow participants to move their assets to a new retirement plan.

This is an important option for those considering changing jobs.

Plan Maintenance

Once the plan is created, it must be effectively maintained; this means putting in place a good maintenance plan so that large savings can be built in preparation for retirement.

Make sure that the service you are considering offers flexible vesting schedules along with employer contribution options.

Choosing to integrate your payroll information directly into the 401(k) will save you a lot of hassle and makes data accessibility and management much easier.

Help And Support

Customer service is crucial, and this is a major consideration when you are looking at the different providers. The world of retirement plans can be overwhelming and very confusing, so you want to know that you have good support available from the company you choose.

It is essential that they provide telephone as well as email support since there may be times when you need to speak with someone quickly.

Check the company’s website for online resources like videos, articles, FAQs and calculators.

Retirement plans like SIMPLE IRA, Safe Harbor Plan and the 401(k) plan are key in helping both you and your employees to build security for the future.

The Top 3 Retirement Planning Service Providers

1 – ADP

Pros

One of the main benefits of ADP is that it gives employees a mobile app which they can use to access their retirement account information online at any time. ADP also make transferring a current retirement plan very easy.

Cons

Because this service does not integrate with any other payroll services except for ADP’s payroll, it can limit your options for integration.

Bottom Line: For many companies ADP is the best employee retirement service and it would be difficult to find another company that offers the wide variety of plans that ADP offers, as well as their maintenance options and online resources.

With help from ADP’s investment experts you can help your employees prepare for the future.

ADP’s retirement service suits all sizes of business; and whether you employ 10 people or thousands of workers, this provider will be suitable and has the knowledge, resources and service to help your company provide the best options for its employees.

Included in the wide range of options and plans ADP provides are: Roth 401 (k), the traditional 401 (k), Safe Harbor 401 (k), SIMPLE IRA, Profit Sharing and the New Comparability Plan.

Because of the fact that ADP does not sell insurance or mutual funds, the plan your agent advices you on will be the one that is best for you, your employees and your company rather than one that has been selected with an alternative motive in mind.

ADP provides excellent support in helping employees to transfer any existing plans to ADP easily and hassle-free, with assistance through every step of the process.

The support from ADP is also extremely effective in assisting employees to enroll in a retirement plan. They provide a range of seminars and brochures that can help employees to fully understand each plan.

In addition to all of this, ADP provides access to your employees to an online account; in this account they will find all of the information that will help them through the whole process.

Reporting tools are also available. One of the most important features of ADP is that employees can receive statements on their retirement plans that will give them an idea of how ready they are for retirement and if there are any important steps they have overlooked.

There are several different plan options and useful tools that can help to educate those who enroll in an ADP plan.

No matter what size your company is, this 401(k) provider will have the resources and knowledge to be able to help.

The ADP service also integrates with its own payroll system; so, if you have ADP payroll, you will find record keeping very efficient and easy.

In addition to this, the mobile app that is offered by ADP is very effective and allows employees to access all of the retirement information related to their plan directly from their mobile device.

2 – Fidelity Investments

Pros

When you are choosing and establishing retirement plans as well as monitoring them, Fidelity Investments will work directly with you. One of the biggest benefits of this service is that it integrates with almost all payroll services, making it very flexible.

Cons

This service does not offer live chat support unfortunately and it took several days for them to reply to our email.

Bottom Line: Fidelity Investments offers many tools that can help employees to properly prepare for retirement.

Fidelity Investments is a good option for your company if you are looking for a retirement plan solution with plenty of resources, support and features. Working with companies of all sizes, this 401 (k) provider is an excellent choice for any size business.

In addition to a substantial range of retirement plan options, Fidelity also offer a mobile app and a flexibility in payroll integrations. There are also a great number of unique, smaller details that they have added to their service that make it stand out.

We found there was very little to complain about when it comes to choosing a retirement plan with Fidelity.

Included in the range of plan options provided by Fidelity are: Profit Sharing, 401 (k), IRA and Safe Harbor Plans.

You can choose to receive advice and support from their team when you are creating and monitoring your plans. They provide an expert who will work with you to make sure that you are getting the best possible option for your employees to secure their future.

Your employees will also be able to access and monitor their plans from any web browser once they have been set up. The Fidelity Sponsor WebStation can be accessed via the Fidelity Investments website.

Through this service an employee can constantly monitor their progress and make sure that they are on track to be fully prepared for their retirement.

A current retirement plan can be transferred into one account with Fidelity and this roll over option means it is much simpler and easier for an employee to monitor their retirement savings. This also helps them to avoid multiple account fees.

Providing an extensive number of options for plans, Fidelity are experts at making things as easy and stress-free as possible for employees.

Although we would have preferred a faster response time to our email enquiry, this company is still well worth considering since they provide such an excellent service in online resources that enable visitors to find many answers to questions on their own.

Easily one of the best employee retirement solutions out there, Fidelity Investments provide a significant choice of plans, advanced features and online resources.

3 – Paychex

Pros

Flexibility is the main benefit of this company and they also offer a mobile app and payroll integration.

Cons

We waited several days to receive a response from a Paychex representative.

Bottom Line: One of the best employee retirement services available, Paychex offers a range of plans, support resources and features that mean it is a great option for any size business.

This service allows you to customize retirement plans to specifically fit your company’s needs.

It is an ideal provider for a business of any size and no matter how many employees you have, Paychex can help to create a retirement plan that fits perfectly.

One of the great features of this company is that it offers automatic enrollment options along with a wide range of different retirement plans.

Paychex enables you to fully customize your retirement plan according to your particular company’s needs. This makes it a very personalized service.

Allowing you to create a plan that meets the particular criteria you are looking for, this employee retirement plan company is fully flexible.

An additional benefit of this retirement solution is the variety of its website options. Through their employee information site, employees are able to educate themselves on the 401 (k) plan and how it works in detail.

After an employee has signed up they can then access all of their account information through the participant website.

In addition to this, Paychex also provides an employer website where you will be able to access participant information, plan investments and much more.

This means that not only is it an excellent option for your employees, but it also gives you the control and insight you need at your fingertips.

Overall, Paychex is an excellent choice and its flexibility along with the user friendly enrollment process make it one of the best options for retirement plan solutions available.