We’ve updated the names of four of the vintages in the American Funds Target Date Retirement Series to reflect the funds’ focus on income after reaching the retirement target date. The change impacts the following funds:
• American Funds 2010 Target Date Retirement Fund® is now the American Funds 2010 Target Date Retirement Income Fund
• American Funds 2015 Target Date Retirement Fund® is now the American Funds 2015 Target Date Retirement Income Fund
• American Funds 2020 Target Date Retirement Fund® is now the American Funds 2020 Target Date Retirement Income Fund
• American Funds 2025 Target Date Retirement Fund® is now the American Funds 2025 Target Date Retirement Income Fund
The name change does not affect the investments in any other way, including the fund objectives, strategies, portfolios and management. Going forward, we will continue to add “Income” to the target date fund names after each fund’s target date is reached.
Stay up to date on the Spanish-language services we offer to help participants. This overview sheet has a handy list of the many documents and other resources available, from enrollment books for eligible employees to live customer service, educational brochures and more.
We’re making a number of enhancements for PlanPremier plans to support provisions of the SECURE 2.0 Act:
• Emergency personal expense withdrawals: This new distribution type is now available to help participants meet unforeseeable financial obligations such as medical expenses, auto repairs or other urgent and immediate personal needs. Contact us for more information on this or other distribution types made available through the SECURE 2.0 Act, including options to make hardship distributions easier to process by eliminating collection of backup documentation and allowing participants to self certify.
• Rollovers from SIMPLE IRAs: For plans that currently allow rollovers from IRAs, we will soon add SIMPLE IRAs as an acceptable rollover type, supporting new rules under the SECURE 2.0 Act that allow participants to roll over amounts from a SIMPLE IRA to a qualified plan or IRA within two years of participation. This rollover type will be added effective April 1, 2026.
• Annual paper statements: To satisfy new rules under the SECURE 2.0 Act, beginning this year we will send one paper statement per year to participants who were defaulted to e-delivery with a personal email on file. In plans using the “wired-at-work” delivery method permitted by the Department of Labor, participants defaulted to e-delivery with a work email address will receive an initial paper notification by mail with information about e-delivery, including instructions on how to opt-out of e-delivery. (These changes do not apply to 403(b) plans or plans set up with paper delivery).
Click below for more information on our recordkeeping support of SECURE 2.0 Act provisions.
The IRS recently released new contribution limits for 2026, raising the limits across most plan types.
You can encourage your participants to use the new contribution limits and leverage our interactive tools to set a personalized retirement goal and track their progress on the participant website or mobile app.
As the plan year ends, there are several deadlines and potential action items that plan sponsors should be aware of. These include year-end notices and disclosures, mandatory distributions, required minimum distribution reminders, and more.
Refer to the following resources to help you meet these year-end retirement plan obligations.
Starting January 1, 2026, catch-up contributions for participants who earned more than $150,000 (indexed annually) in Social Security FICA wages in the prior calendar year must be made as Roth contributions.
Plans that don’t allow Roth contributions should consider adding Roth elective deferrals as a contribution type. If a plan does not offer Roth contributions, higher-paid participants subject to the Roth catch-up requirement will not be able to make catch-up contributions. If you don’t want to offer Roth contributions, you may also remove the option to make catch-up contributions.
We encourage you to work with your payroll provider now to ensure catch-up contributions for higher-paid participants are directed appropriately. For plans that automatically switch catch-up contributions from pretax to Roth when a participant is subject to the Roth catch-up requirement, the sponsor/payroll provider is responsible for changing impacted participants’ deferrals from pretax to Roth. For plans that don’t have a Roth source, sponsor/payroll providers are responsible for stopping impacted participants’ deferrals when the applicable deferral limit is reached.
We can help you comply with this requirement by collecting a new high-earner indicator on our system that identifies participants who are subject to the Roth catch-up requirement. The indicator will drive reports with relevant data to assist with contribution processing and identifying any participants that may require corrections, as well as payroll warnings and custom participant messaging.
Watch for more details soon, including information on how to add the high-earner indicator to the recordkeeping system.
The Save-o-meter is a new tool available on the ICanRetire homepage that’s designed to help participants maximize their company match. Now, participants can better see if they’re leaving free money on the table.
We’ve also refreshed the existing planning calculator to include an option for employer matching. If matching isn’t available, participants can enter 0%.
Both tools are available on the ICanRetire homepage.
Signing up for eligibility tracking, online enrollment, automatic enrollment and beneficiary tracking can simplify the process of offering a retirement plan.
If your plan is already taking advantage of these features, you’ll likely have more participants using these options as we are nearing the end of the year.
And if you haven’t signed up yet, keep a lookout for upcoming webinar invitations where you can learn more about these time-saving features. You may also contact us if you’re unable to attend a webinar.
For more information, call us at (877) 872-5159.