Interest among plan sponsors in automatic enrollment, step-up deferral rate solutions and target date funds continues to increase, according to Mesirow Financial's 2013 Retirement Plan Survey Report. The results of the survey confirm three top initiatives plan sponsors are considering to keep their plans competitive while fulfilling their fiduciary duties. Key findings include:
• Automatic solutions continue to play a key role in plan design, as approximately 55% of plan sponsors surveyed offer automatic enrollment features — a 5% increase from last year.
• Interest in step-up deferral rate solutions continues to rise — 44% of respondents offer this as an option.
• The rapid growth of target-date funds continues, as more than 85% of plan sponsors reporting using this type of solution — up 13% from last year.
• Fee disclosure is top of mind, with almost 88% of plan sponsors reviewing implicit and explicit plan fees in the past six months.
The report also addresses retirement plan design, fiduciary oversight options employee education and other topics. This is the third year Mesirow has conducted the survey.
