"Heather" <HeatherRain@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote
> It gets worse. Not only that, they want to top it all off
> with a $40
> account closing/servicing fee. I almost died. They want
> $40 out of
> *MY* retirement when they can't even do what I asked?!?
> Is that
> legal? Is there anything I can do to fight *THAT*??
Hi Heather, a fee of this amount is usual when transferring
assets from one brokerage (custodian, whatever) to another
and closing an account. It does take time, and this at least
keeps people from transferring willy-nilly, which raises
costs for all of us. Fidelity, TRowePrice, Vanguard etc. all
have asset transfer and/or closing account fees like this,
though occasionally they offer specials. A few years ago,
USAA Investment Management Company offered reimbursement of
any transfer fees a brokerage house charged for moving
assets to USAA IMCO, plus they offered something like ten
free stock trades, good for a year. Shop around, and maybe
you can find a brokerage that will give you incentive to
move your assets there. Don't count on it, but these days
when banks are eager for money on deposit, it's worth a try.
As Dave and kastnna indicate, it is not a big deal to roll
it over to a Trad IRA, then convert a bit at a time. What's
going on here, anyway? You have just a few thousand in the
account or are we talking upwards of say $10k? Do you have
the money sitting outside this account to pay the taxes on
this in one fell swoop?
I would cut the plan management some slack while it gets up
to speed. The law for direct rollover is fairly new. That
your plan currently is not set up for direct rollover is not
a big deal. Plus having more efficiency and professionalism
yada generally means more costs to plan participants. Maybe
your plan is low cost all-in-all, and this is the tradeoff.
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