Changed from job that had a 401K, and the new one doesn't. How do I answer when filing?
If you had a retirement plan at any time in 2013 you are considered covered by an plan. Are You Covered by an Employer's Retirement Plan? You’re covered by an employer retirement plan for a tax year if your   employer (or your spouse’s employer) has a: Defined contribution plan (profit-sharing, 401(k), stock bonus and money purchase pension plan) and any contributions or forfeitures were   allocated to your account for the plan year ending with or within the   tax year; IRA-based plan (SEP, SARSEP or SIMPLE IRA plan) and you had an amount contributed to your IRA for the plan year that ends with or   within the tax year; or Defined benefit plan (pension plan that pays a retirement benefit spelled out in the plan) and you are eligible to participate for the   plan year ending with or within the tax year. Box 13 on the Form W-2 you receive from your employer should contain a   check in the “Retirement plan” box if you are covered. If you are   still not certain, check with your (or your spouse’s) employer. The limits on the amount you can deduct don’t affect the amount you   can contribute. However, you can never deduct more than you actually   contribute. Additional Resources: Publication 590, Individual Retirement Arrangements (IRAs)
Do not take the cash! You might be able to leave the money with the large company.  Ask the HR people at the company.  If you are satisfied with their work, no sense leaving if you don't have to.  I have coworkers that have 401K all over from all the buyouts the company went through. If you don't want to leave it behind, do a rollover into your own account with a low cost carrier.  (Vanguard, Fidelity and Charles Schwab are popular)  Whoever you choose for your own account can help you rollover the funds without penalty.  (Schwab helped me over the phone, it was pretty simple) More about rolling over a Roth 401K "Rolling an old 401k into a new 401k is generally only for ease of management. For example, how many bank accounts do you really want? As long as the funds are reasonably allocated I've found it can be a useful ""mind game"" to leave it separate. Sometimes it's desirable to ignore an account and let it grow, and it is a nice surprise when finally adding all the account balances together. In other words, I keep thinking I've got X (the amount of my biggest or current 401k), which affects/helps my habits and desire to save. When I add them all together I'm shocked to find out I've got Y (the total of all accounts). Personally, I've had big paperwork problems transferring an old 403b (same type process as 401k) even when I had an adviser helping me move it. In the end it was worth moving it, because I'm having the adviser manage it. I'm actually writing this answer specifically because I recently moved a big 401k into a Traditional IRA. A rep from the brokerage, representing my previous employer, kept calling me to find out how they could help (I didn't brush him off). I found that using an IRA provided me with the opportunity to do self-guided investments in funds or even individual stocks, well beyond the limited selection of the old company's 401k. It was useful/interesting to me to invest in low-fee vehicles such as index funds (ie: the Buffett recommendation), and I'll find some stocks as well. Oh and when the old company 401k has certain funds being discontinued, I didn't want to notice the mandated changes years later. So, I'd suggest you consider management and flexibility of the 401k or equivalent, and any of your special personal circumstances/goals. If you end up with a few retirement accounts, I suggest you use an account aggregating website to see or follow your net worth. I know many who, based on various concerns and their portfolio, find an acceptable website to use." Having 401k or HSA is not income and doesn't trigger filing requirements. Withdrawing from 401k or HSA does. Also, in some States, HSA gains are taxed as investment income, so if you have gains in an HSA and you're a resident of such a State - you'll need to file a State tax return and pay taxes on the gains. "You might consider working on getting your new employer to sponsor a 401k, there may be options where you can invest and they aren't required to add anything as a match (which gives you higher limits). If they don't match, they may just be liable for some administration fees. If you have any side business that you do, you might also be eligible for other ""self-employed"" options that have higher limits (SEP, Simple - I think they may go up to $15k) although, I'm not sure the nitty gritties of them." Ok, so if I have a 401k, when does it become mine? When I retire and start taking distributions from it? At that point, is the only thing I own what I actually take out or is the full balance mine? Who owns the 401k when I'm contributing? This is just raising more questions. You can probably roll it over into the new company's 401k too, so just talk to your HR rep there.  I set up a separate Vangard IRA so when I changejobs or anything, I just dump my investments into that account and don't have to worry about keep track of them all over the place. "(Insert usual disclaimer that I'm just a random guy on the Internet, not any kind of certified tax professional.) But once I withdraw the money, how is that money taxable? If I'm understanding your situation correctly, you want to look at the instructions for form 8889, under Excess Employer Contributions. It simply says, ""If the excess was not included in income on Form W-2, you must report it as 'Other income' on your tax return."" There doesn't look to be any particular wording beyond that, so I'd just put it on Form 1040 Line 21 Other Income, and label the line really specifically like ""Excess Employer Contributions distributed from HSA"". Also there is no mention of whether any FICA taxes (social security and Medicare) apply to these amounts. You say that this was entirely contributed by the employer. But even for cases where one contributes directly through payroll with an optional pre-tax deduction, this is usually implemented as a ""salary reduction agreement"" where the company is actually paying less money in salary (and thus less showing up on the W-2) and just contributing to the HSA account instead. It's listed on the 8889 as an ""Employer Contribution"", even if in fact one sees it as a deduction on one's pay stub. In either case, since the company didn't pay you the money as salary (and merely contributed to the HSA instead), I wouldn't expect any FICA taxes to be owed on it. The fact that the IRS wants it listed under ""Other income"" instead of ""Wages"" also implies to me that it doesn't count as salary that needs FICA taxes. Presumably, if people abused this in some way (like getting their employer to deliberately over-contribute each year and getting a refund in some sort of crazy scheme to try to reduce their SS taxes) the government would get rather upset and probably call it some sort of tax evasion. But for the amounts involved here, particularly as you're following the instructions listed, I just wouldn't worry about it. Assuming that I withdraw excess contribution and report everything on Form 8889 and Form 1040, is there any further action required from my previous employer? It's your HSA, so I wouldn't think so. Since the eligibility for HSAs is based on what you do, and not what they do (you could, for instance, get covered by a different HDHP and they wouldn't be notified nor really care), I don't think they have anything more to do with it. Also I am not sure how to calculate amount of interest attributable to excess contribution. I have only around $0.20 of total interest this year. The bank holding the HSA could probably help with that, as I'd expect it to be a normal part of the excess contribution withdrawal process. If not, I'd just make a reasonable effort based on the interest rate, amount involved, and number of days that the excess was in the account. Also keep in mind that in general when filing taxes, anything under $0.49 can round to $0. At some point, one can only be ""as honest as the law allows""." There are two problems with your understanding: The companies I have worked for match based on a percentage of your salary. That is a percentage of your gross pay. It was not based on the percentage of your net pay or after-tax pay. Net pay would be too hard to know. What I mean is the amount of insurance, HSA, Flex spending accounts, etc. determine how much is taxable and thus what is your after-tax pay . In fact if you split between the Roth and Pre-tax forms of the 401K your retirement contribution would influence the amount of the after tax contribution. All matching funds no matter the nature of the contribution (pre-tax, post-tax, Roth) are always considered pre-tax. You didn't pay taxes on the money when it was credited to your account. When you leave an employer, 401(k) loans are immediately due (or within 30 days or 60 days). So maybe they are waiting to see if you will pay off your loan. If you wanted to transfer the loan as well, you need to talk to your new 401(k) plan administrator to find out if this even possible. If they say No and you don't pay off the loan, it will count as a premature distribution from your old 401(k) plan and possibly be subject to excise tax in addition to income tax. Someone messed up here. My tax accountant says she is supposed to enter the values as they are on the W2 and CompanyB said they will not issue a new W2 because they were not involved in the refund of the money. Correct. We decided that we will enter a value different from 12b-d, subtract the money that was refunded to me because it's already on the 1099.  Incorrect. Is there an alternative to avoid paying taxes twice on the 401k overages? If not, is there a better way to do this to minimize the risk of an audit? You should enter the amounts in W2 as they are. Otherwise things won't tie at the IRS and they will come back asking questions. The amount in box 12-D was deducted from your wages pre-tax, so you didn't pay tax on it. The distribution is taxable, and if it was made before the tax day next year - only taxable once. So if you withdrew the same year of the contribution, as it sounds like you did, you will only pay tax on it once because the amounts were not included in your salary. If the 1099-R is marked with the correct code, the IRS will be able to match the excess contribution (box 12-D) and the removal of the excess contribution (1099-R with the code) and it will all tie, no-one will audit you. The accountant is probably clueless as to how her software works. By default, the accounting software will add the excess contribution on W2 box 12-D back into wages, and it will be added to taxable income on your tax return. However, when you type in the 1099 with the proper code, this should be reversed by the software, and if it is not - should be manually overridden. This should be done at the adjustment entry, not the W2 entry screen, since a copy of the W2 will be transmitted with your tax return and should match the actual W2 transmitted by your employer. If she doesn't know what she's doing, find someone who does. "Your employer sends the money that you choose to contribute, plus employer match if any, to the administrator of the 401k plan who invests the money as you have directed, choosing between the alternatives offered by the administrator. Typically, the alternatives are several different mutual funds with different investment styles, e.g. a S&P 500 index fund, a bond fund, a money-market fund, etc.  Now, a statement such as ""I see my 401k is up 10%"" is meaningless unless you  tell us how you are making the comparison. For example, if you have just started employment and $200 goes into your 401k each month and is invested in a money-market fund (these are paying close to 0% interest  these days), then your 11th contribution increases your  401k from $2000 to $2200 and your 401k is ""up 10%"". More generally, suppose for simplicity that all the  401k investment is in just one (stock) mutual fund and that you own 100 shares of the fund as of right now.  Suppose also that your next contribution will not occur for three weeks when you get your next paycheck, at which time additional shares of the mutual fund will be purchased Now, the value of the mutual fund shares (often referred to as net asset value or NAV) fluctuates as stock prices rise and fall, and so the  401k balance = number of shares times NAV changes in accordance with these fluctuations. So,  if the NAV increases by 10% in the next two weeks, your 401k balance will have increased by 10%.  But you still own only 100 shares of the mutual fund. You cannot use the 10% increase  in value to buy more shares in the mutual fund  because there is no money to pay for the additional shares  you wish to purchase.  Notice that there is no point selling some of the shares (at the 10% higher NAV) to get cash  because you will be purchasing shares at the higher NAV too. You could, of course, sell shares of the stock mutual fund at the higher NAV and buy shares of some other fund available to you in the 401k plan.  One advantage of doing this inside the 401k plan is that you don't have to pay taxes (now) on the 10% gain that you have made on the sale. Outside tax-deferred plans such as 401k and IRA plans, such gains would be taxable in the year of the sale.  But note that selling the shares of the stock fund and buying something else indicates that you believe that the NAV of your stock mutual fund is unlikely to increase any further in the near future. A third possibility for your 401k being up by 10% is that the mutual fund paid a dividend or made a capital gains distribution in the two week period that we are discussing.  The NAV falls when such events occur, but if you have chosen to reinvest the dividends and capital gains, then the number of shares that you own goes up.  With the same example as before, the NAV goes up 10% in two weeks at which time a capital gains distribution occurs, and so the NAV falls back to where it was before.  So, before the capital gains distribution, you owned 100 shares at $10 NAV which went up to $11 NAV (10% increase in NAV) for a net increase in 401k balance from $1000 to $1100. The mutual fund distributes capital gains in the amount of $1 per share sending the NAV back to $10, but you take the $100 distribution and plow it back into the mutual fund, purchasing 10 shares at the new $10 NAV.  So now you own 110 shares at $10 NAV (no net change in price in two weeks) but your 401k balance is $1100, same as it was before the capital gains distribution and you are up 10%.  Or, you could have chosen to invest the distributions into, say, a bond fund available in your 401k plan and still be up 10%, with no change in your stock fund holding, but a new investment of $100 in a  bond fund. So, being up 10% can mean different things and does not necessarily mean that the ""return"" can be used to buy more shares." I recently rejected an offer at a different firm that would have provided a 14k yearly increase. The reason for the rejection was because I would have had to give up two work from home days, my commute would have been about an hour and half each way, I would have lost about 14 extra days of PTO and holiday pay, and the new company didn't match anything for 401k. Okay thanks, let's hope it's a relatively painless process to correct my mistake!   Really odd that my 401(k)s are traditional, I was so sure they weren't.  Maybe it's better then to open up a traditional IRA alongside the Roth, use that for rollovers, and just kick a few bucks into the Roth on occasion? "IANAL, but no, this is not sound legal advice. There are a few things that stick out to me as fishy. First off: you are calculating the 3% safe-harbor on the 2017 compensation limit of $270k, but limiting yourself to $53k in total contributions which is the 2016 limit. It's hard to tell what tax year you're working in here. If you're planning for 2017, fine, but if you're wrapping up 2016 then you need to use 2016 limits. Secondly (and this is something I think your counsel should know already): you don't take Employer contributions out of gross wages (box 1) on the W-2. They aren't even reported there in the first place! With your base scenario the 2 employees' W-2s would look like this: Employee A's W-2 Gross Wages (box 1) = 280,000 - 14,966.67 = 265,033.33 Employee B's W-2 Gross Wages (box 1) = 280,000 - 0 = 280,000 Elective deferrals are the only thing that should come out of wages. Not the SH 3% or Match. Thirdly: Retirement Plan expenses really aren't an ""above the line"" expense. They are not included in cost of goods sold. Even if you establish a ""pool"" for that expense, it's still not a direct cost attributable to the production of whatever your company sells. Also: Employee B should not have to contribute to the retirement account of Employee A! The only situation I can see where Employee A and B would be required to fund the match equally, were if Employee A & B are both 50% owners and the company has no funds of its own with which to fund the match. The company has obligated itself to fund the match, and if the company doesn't have any money then the money still has to come from somewhere (ie. the owners pony up more funds for the match they promised their employees, it just happens that the employees are also the owners). Even in this situation though, I still stand behind my first 3 points." Your 401k IRA will now have three different sub-accounts, the one holding your Traditional (pre-tax) 401k contributions, the one holding your Roth 401k contributions, and the one holding the employer match contributions (which, as has been pointed out to you, cannot be considered to be Roth 401k contributions). That is, it is not true that So my next month's check shows $500+$500 going to the regular 401k, and $82+$82 going to the Roth 401k. Your next month's paystub will show $500 going into the regular 401k, $100 going into the Roth 401k, and if employer matching contributions are listed on the paystub, it will still show $600 going into the employer match. If you have chosen to invest your 401k in mutual funds (or stocks), shares are purchased when the 401k administrator receives the money and are also segregated in the three subaccounts. If you are paid monthly, then you will know on a month-by-month basis how many shares you hold in the three  separate subaccounts, and there is no end-of-year modification of how many shares were purchased with Roth 401k contributions versus how many were purchased with  pretax contributions or with employer matching funds as you seem to think.