Equity Financial Services

Since our platform has an integration with your payroll provider, we can process your payroll files through automation.

Equity Financial Services offers a 360° level of integration.

This guide will help you set up your integration and understand your specific responsibilities for the proper administration of payroll files.

1. How Does My Integration Work?
2. Are There Any Reasons Why My Plan Might Not Be Eligible for an Integration?
3. How Do I Initiate My Integration Setup?
4. What Are My Responsibilities if My Plan Has an Active Payroll Integration?
5. What Do You Handle for Me if My Plan Has an Active Payroll Integration?
6. Will My Payroll Provider Charge Me Fees to Set up And/or Maintain My Payroll Integration?
7. How Do I Disconnect My Integration? 

How Does My Integration Work?

You have a 360° automated Integration. This is a two-way integration in which we will automatically receive certain information about your plan and participating employees from your payroll system, process employee and employer contributions to the plan, and automatically send your employees’ selected deferral elections from their portal to your payroll provider.

Are There Any Reasons Why My Plan Might Not Be Eligible for an Integration?

There are some plan design features that currently prohibit the use of payroll integration. This includes:

• Plans with multiple logins into their payroll system
• Plans that do not have an established recurring pay schedule setup in either your portal or the payroll system
• Plans that do not use the same payroll provider for all pay group(s)
• Plans that have limitations that prevent each pay group from being integrated
• Eligibility rules that exclude certain classes of employees, types of compensation, or certain types of hours worked
• Plans with per pay period non-mandatory employer contributions
• Plans that allow after-tax contributions (only available if your plan uses a Third Party Administrator)
  • Note: After-tax and Roth contributions are not the same.

How Do I Initiate My Integration Setup?

To set up your integration, please email your Equity Financial Services representative or payroll specialist directly requesting to use the integration with Vestwell. Your representative will work with you to set up your retirement plan in the payroll system. Be sure to specify the expected first integrated pay date.

Note: If your integration has not yet been activated, contribution uploads into the portal will be required until our team notifies you that the integration can begin.

What Are My Responsibilities if My Plan Has an Active Payroll Integration? 

Our ability to successfully process your payroll files and administer your plan depends on you. Your responsibilities as an employer with an active payroll integration are outlined below. 

Payroll Codes

Work with your payroll representative to set these payroll codes within your payroll system.

• Pre-Tax 401(k) $
• Pre-Tax 401(k) %
• Roth 401(k) $
• Roth 401(k) %
• Employer Contribution(s)
• Retirement Loans

 Loans

• Set up and maintain retirement loans within your payroll system. 

Discretionary and/or Profit-Sharing Contributions 

• Set up and maintain non-mandatory employer contributions in your payroll system.
• Submit non-mandatory employer contributions through your portal using an off-cycle upload.

Mandatory Employer Contributions

• Maintain and submit mandatory employer contributions that are on a frequency other than a per-pay period basis using an off-cycle upload.

Pay Groups

• Make sure any pay groups in your payroll system are also set up in your portal and vice versa. To edit a pay group name or set up new pay groups, please see our article, “How Do I Change My Pay Group With an Enabled Integration?” prior to your first pay date.
• The number of pay groups or companies in your payroll system may affect your plan’s eligibility to integrate.

Employee Status Changes - Payroll System

• Update your payroll system when employees are hired, terminated, or rehired. Include a specific date when making these status changes.

Employee Personal Information

• Maintain complete, accurate, and up-to-date personal information within your payroll system. This includes date of birth, social security number, and email address. 

Pay Frequency/Schedule Changes

• Report any pay frequency or pay schedule changes to your retirement plan representative to ensure there is no delay in processing your payroll files upon making this change in your payroll system.

Review Payroll Data

• We rely on you to provide us with correct, updated, and complete data about your employees, regardless of whether we receive that data directly from you or from your payroll provider. Regular audits and spot checks of the data provided to us will help you quickly identify and rectify any discrepancies.

What Do You Handle for Me If My Plan Has an Active Payroll Integration?

Employee Deferrals - First Integrated Payroll

• Four business days before your first integrated pay date with us, we will use the employee deferral rates in the portal to set employee elections in your payroll system. To guarantee that employee deferral rates have been updated in your payroll system, do not run payroll four business days before your scheduled pay date.

Employee Deferral Updates

• Ongoing deferral changes made in the portal by eligible employees will be set in your payroll system within two business days.  
• We will communicate any deferral update requests to your payroll system. Employees may not see this reflected in their next few paychecks, as it could take time for this update to be reflected.
• If your plan has an auto-enrollment feature, the same guidelines above apply.

Employee Status Changes in the Portal

• When you add, rehire, or terminate employees in your payroll system, the changes will be reflected in the portal one business day after the next pay date.

Processing Contributions

• Process employee deferrals and employer contributions, which are maintained by the integration, shortly after you run payroll in your payroll system.
• If you process payroll early, we may process the contribution file before the pay date.

Will My Payroll Provider Charge Me Fees to Set Up and/or Maintain My Payroll Integration?

Your payroll provider may charge fees in conjunction with the integration. Please check with your Equity Financial Services representative for more specific details. 

We will not charge you to facilitate this integration.

How Do I Disconnect My Integration?

If you change payroll providers, it is your responsibility to inform us so that we can disconnect your integration and assess whether integration with a different payroll provider is available. Please reach out to your retirement plan representative, and we will assist you.

If your plan has been amended or if you are considering amending your original plan documents, please inform your retirement plan representative to understand what actions you will need to take to submit and process your payroll files correctly.