401k Custodian Fees

[explanade]

Left my 401k balance with my old employer. Fees were a reasonable $20 a year.

Now increasing to $40 a year.

What are people paying?

I guess I could roll it over to my Roth or traditional IRA account ...

 

[bclover]

Left my 401k balance with my old employer. Fees were a reasonable $20 a year.

Now increasing to $40 a year.

What are people paying?

I guess I could roll it over to my Roth or traditional IRA account ...

where do you find the fees my old 401K is with merryl lynch and they swore they were making fees more "transparent"

 

[explanade]

It depends on the custodian.

They emailed me with the fee increases.

 

[jazz4cash]

I don't pay anything except the normal er and trading fees on 2 plans at Fido. Have you asked if there is any way to avoid the fees? I agree 20 is not so bad but 40 is too much unless they have some extraordinary options.

 

[emerytura]

My old 401K is with Fidelity - it cost me $43 per year record keeping fee.

 

[marinauser]

No account fees to maintain my account at prior employer.

 

[Texas Proud]

Just as an FYI... the determination of who pays the fee is determined by the company, not the 401(k) provider...

The plan that I set up for my old employer, the company paid the fee for any employee that was still employed.... when you left the company then it was passed on to you...


The owner was not willing to shell out money for someone who quit... especially if it was a small account... However, I do think we had said that if the account was less than $5K (maybe $10K) it would be liquidated if the person did not move it... but this 'memory' is kinda sketchy....

 

[RetireAge50]

My 401k fees were always paid by the company until they recently added a flat $17 fee per quarter. I don't like it but it is only .0001 of the balance or 1/100 of a percent so I guess I will live with it.

The 401k has good investment choices with low expense ratios (like Vanguard S&P .04% expenses). Also has a good stable value fund which I can use instead of having a cash account somewhere else.

 

[Bamaman]

When I retired, the company required I take my 401K into a IRA rollover--elsewhere. They would no longer pick up any fees.

Our 401K's were limited for many years to conservative and middle of the road mutual funds. MegaCorp didn't open up the 401K's to the really good Fidelity mutual funds. They came back and said if we paid the fees, we could open our portfolios to all Fidelity accounts of all kinds. I went self directed paying the fees and made a whole lot more $ than I stayed with the company's 401K funds.

If i was given the options to ETF's back then, I would have been in them due to the very low expenses.

 

[foxfirev5]

My 401k at Fido is $35/year. The only reason i keep it is that the stable value fund yields more than 5 year CDs .

 

[explanade]

Hmm, so it's about in line with other custodians.

The other part of it is that they're getting rid of VBTIX that I'm in and they're moving to something called Vanguard Total Bond Market Index Trust.

Might not be a bad time to roll over to Vanguard IRA ...

 

[Texas Proud]

My 401k fees were always paid by the company until they recently added a flat $17 fee per quarter. I don't like it but it is only .0001 of the balance or 1/100 of a percent so I guess I will live with it.

The 401k has good investment choices with low expense ratios (like Vanguard S&P .04% expenses). Also has a good stable value fund which I can use instead of having a cash account somewhere else.

It might not be bad for you... but for someone starting out and only have $5K it is pretty high.... this is only the 401(k) fee and does not include the ER of the funds...

 

[swakyaby]

My employer starts charging $250 a year if I leave my retirement money with them after I retire. Currently I see no deductions from my account while I am still working.