Advisor Alliance: 401GO

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From time-to-time, Insightful Accountant features various programs in our Advisor Alliance articles. We created Advisor Alliance as a way to make you aware of opportunities that exist with different companies that can help you gain more business, improve your business performance as it relates to their offerings and your clients, and to essentially earn more money through a working relationship with these companies.

One such program we want to make you aware of is the 401GO Partner Program. 401GO has a mission of ensuring every American is ready for retirement, but they realize they can’t do it alone. They understand the critical role Partners play in helping businesses with their 401k. Their Partner-based model is built to make life easy so Partners' can focus on service rather than paperwork, billing and all the hassles of traditional plans. 401GO wants every plan they manage to have the support of a local Partner, in fact, if they get a plan that wasn’t referred from a Partner, they try to pair them up with one of their trusted Partners.

So about now you are wondering what 401GO does? 401GO is a custom-built 401(k) platform that's focused on automation and technology to make it easier and much more affordable for companies to sponsor a 401(k) plan. They help with the annual administration, which includes all required notifications to both employees participating and employers sponsoring the 401(k) plan, as well as authorizing distributions and loans, and the required tax filing (Form 5500). They also have a separate investment fiduciary that reviews and monitors investments within the 401(k) plan. In other words, 401GO provides full-service to make 401(k) plans easy! And they also make it easy for you to 'Partner' to help them offer 401(k) plans to your clients.

The 401GO Partner Program is designed to:

  • Save advisors time. 401k plans are overly complex and so most accountants and advisors avoid them even though they have a lot of tax and business benefits. The 401GO automated plan setup easily guides a Partner and their client through the process and has a plan up and running in under 15 minutes. Payroll integrations and full plan automation (filings, testing, notifications, etc.) are all handled by the platform.
  • Build advisor revenue streams. Unlike most 401k options where a securities license of some sort would be required, the 401GO platform approach lets us pay Partners for the clients they bring and the services they provide. 401GO offers our Partners two models of compensation: 1) upfront referral fee of $30 per employee that joins OR 2) $2 per active employee per month. So, with a 20 person company with 100% participation, the advisor can take a $600 one-time referral incentive or an ongoing $40 per month compensation.
  • Give advisors an option of the participation approach. We have some partners that take a very active role in the 401k plans on the 401GO platform and 401GO provides the tools they need to do so. Other Partners simply elect to send referral links to their clients and 401GO will facilitate all setup and handle all administration. 401GO is full service and handles 100% of the 401k so anything the partner does (education, general tax advice) to go above and beyond just makes for a better experience and builds partners into heroes for their clients.  

Believe it or not, 401GO doesn't even have any required training, but after a partner joins they like to guide them through a simple setup process. They will also be very involved as the Partner brings their first client onto the platform. After the first couple of plans, most Partners have the confidence to continue without any assistance because the platform is so intuitive and doesn’t really require training or a knowledge of 401k plans. Partners always have access to 401GO support should they need assistance.

Having built several successful businesses, Daniel Beck, 401GO Co-founder and Chief Operating Officer, understands the plight of small business owners and entrepreneurs. For his previous endeavors, offering a 401(k) plan wasn’t a feasible option. Through his obsession to details, his ability to boot-strap and relentless drive, he’s ensuring today’s small businesses can offer a 401(k) plan. Daniel believes that 'partnering' with accountants and advisors make reaching small businesses easier, that's why 401GO is reaching out via Insightful Accountant's Advisor Alliance.

So, if this sounds like a golden opportunity to add a new service to your accounting or consulting practice then head over to the 401GO Partner Program sign-up webpage to request more information.