My partner is allowed a 401k catchup amount to the standard 2023 401k limit. It is an additional $7500. For some reason, the plan sponsor, Paychex, I believe, is throttling her paycheck contributions down dramatically. She had a large percentage of her check being withheld for a good number of pay periods this year, The past month, the plan sponsor cut down her contributions EVEN though she did not change her percentage deduction amounts.
We had enough. We are getting to the end of the year. What state or federal agency can we complain to?
I believe you’re running into the same problem I run into every year. Paychex has separate buckets for regular contributions and catchup contributions. At my old company I could contribute to both regular and catchup at the same time so I could max everything out by the end of the year. But, Paychex forces you to max out your regular contributions first before you can add anything to the catchup bucket. Thus, I have to change my contribution percentages in October and start adding some to the catchup bucket and taking some from the regular bucket. Then, in Nov, I change all contributions to the catchup bucket. Your partner may need to go into Paychex, or their company 401k plan, or wherever the contribution percentages are set, and see if there is a catchup section. If so, change that percentage from 0% to whatever it needs to be to max it for the rest of the year. They’ll also need to set the regular contribution bucket to 0%
OK, thank you. I jumped the gun. It is the catch-up feature she has to elect.
It is annoying. I guess we ASSUMED that since she meets the catchup qualification, it automatically is allowed once she surpasses the $22,500 ( I think that is the amount) limit.
EDIT: Lol, I guess I complained to the Clark Howard Agency here.
That caught me by surprise too when I changed companies 5 years ago who uses Paychex for payroll. It’s a pain. I don’t know why they do this. Maybe it helps keep things straight and them not having to help people at the end who messed things up.