Automatic Enrollment Processing

While the overall process is similar for all automatic enrollment plans, the exact timeline differs slightly depending on your plan’s entry requirements. The timeline and examples for different wait periods are outlined below.

Plans with a 3+ month wait period

Timeline:

1. Your organization reports a newly hired employee to Sentinel, usually via payroll
2. On the following Sunday, Sentinel will run the automatic enrollment process which will populate an automatic enrollment deferral rate and effective date
3. On the 26^th of the month, you will receive the Automatic Enrollment – Employees to Automatically Enroll report (see Automatic Enrollment Reporting for more information). You should use this report to:
   1. Verify that auto enrollees from last month were properly entered into payroll and received the required notices
   2. Enter the rate in payroll for those with an upcoming effective date (if your payroll system allows for this)*
4. On the Monday following a participant’s automatic enrollment date, you will receive the Deferral Changes by Participant report (see Automatic Enrollment Reporting for more information) that includes the auto enrollees. You should use this report to enter the auto enrollment rate in payroll (unless this was already done when the previous report was received on the 26th).*

* If you use 360 payroll (FTP feedback files) with your payroll company, Sentinel will provide the auto enrollment records to the payroll company

Example:

Plan entry requirements: 3 month wait with first of the month entry
New employee’s hire date: July 10
First payroll with new employee included received by Sentinel: Thursday, July 17

On Sunday, July 20, the employee’s record will be updated to show a pending automatic enrollment contribution rate effective November 1.

On Monday, October 26, the employee will appear on the monthly report with a November 1 auto enroll effective date. The employee will appear on this month’s report since they are now within 35 days of their automatic enrollment date.

On Monday, November 6, the employee will appear on the weekly deferral changes report showing a contribution change effective November 1.

Using this example above, you should use the monthly report on October 26 to make the change in payroll. When you receive the deferral rate on the Monday report, you can use that to double check that payroll was updated properly.

Plans with a wait period of less than 3 months

1. Your organization reports a newly hired employee to Sentinel, usually via payroll
2. On the following Sunday, Sentinel will run the automatic enrollment process which will populate an automatic enrollment deferral rate and effective date
3. On the Monday following a participant’s automatic enrollment date, you will receive the Deferral Changes by Participant report (see Automatic Enrollment Reporting for more information) that includes the auto enrollee. Please note: this will not be the Monday immediately following the Sunday the person’s record is updated. It will be the Monday after, so 8 days later. This is because the weekly deferral changes report covers the period from the prior week begin to prior week end (Sunday to Saturday). You should use this report to enter the auto enrollment rate in payroll.*
4. On the 26^th of the month, you will receive the Automatic Enrollment – Employees to Automatically Enroll report  (see Automatic Enrollment Reporting for more information). You should use this report to double check to ensure that payroll was previously update for all new auto enrollees.

* If you utilize 360 payroll (FTP feedback files) with your payroll company, Sentinel will provide the auto enrollment records to the payroll company

Example:

Plan entry requirements: Immediate
New employee’s hire date: July 10
First payroll with new employee included received by Sentinel: Thursday, July 17

On Sunday, July 20, the employee’s record will be updated to show a pending automatic enrollment contribution rate effective July 10.

On Saturday, July 26, the employee will appear on the monthly automatic enrollment report with a July 10 auto enroll effective date.

On Monday, July 28, the employee will appear on the weekly deferral changes report showing a contribution change effective July 10. Using this example above, you should use the monthly report from July 26 to make the change in payroll. When you receive the deferral rate on the Monday report, you can use that to double check that they updated payroll properly.

If the new hire was reported one week earlier (on the payroll received on Thursday, July 10), the employee would have auto enrolled in census on Sunday, July 13. They would then have appeared on the weekly deferral changes report on Monday, July 21, at which point you should auto enroll them. Then, you would get the monthly report on July 26, which you would use to double-check that payroll was updated properly.

NOTE: You always have the option to add the auto enrollment rate to payroll as soon as you hire the employee.  You may want to do this to avoid the delay inherent with the process.  You can still use the reports we will send as a good double check.