Candy C. Okuhama, CEO and David J. John, Managing DirectorHowever, managing retirement plans and the associated complex regulations is easier said than done. Without in-house expertise, employers face a tough time building a sound retirement plan strategy that aligns with business objectives.
This is where a partner like ASC Trust can do wonders. This premier third-party administrator (TPA) and recordkeeping firm is the leader of retirement plan management in Micronesia. It designs, administers, and consults on the best possible retirement plan for businesses and their employees, managing over 640 retirement plans, representing 36,000 participants, and dealing with over $1 billion in assets.
“ASC was founded in 1990 when retirement planning was not even a buzzword. Since then, we have been responsible for designing defined contribution systems in multiple island countries. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that we have developed this industry in the Micronesian region,” says David John, Managing Director, ASC Trust.
One Size Does Not Fit All
ASC Trust (ASC) has the expertise to handle the complexities of a small client as well as a large client with significant volume requirements. This allows it to work with Fortune 500 companies and SMBs across the public and private sectors.
While serving clients, ASC never undertakes a one-size-fits-all approach and focuses on understanding the nature of their businesses and expectations for retirement plans. For example, it provides prospective clients with a complimentary plan design discussion. This enables it to ensure the retirement plan align with long-term business objectives, workforce demographics, tax objectives, and retirement requirements.
Once the plan is designed with the sponsor, ASC completes the plan documents and makes them signature ready. More importantly, it ensures their plans work according to the terms of plan documents at every step. It also communicates critical plan details with clients on time through on-site employee meetings, service visits, monthly participant newsletters, participant introductions, welcome kits, and one-on-one advisory meetings.
“As a full-service company, we handle everything from plan documents and administration to tax reporting, compliance work, employee meetings and education,” says John. “This ability to offer a comprehensive range of services is our biggest differentiator in the market.”
Our goal is really to help people in Micronesia understand the importance of retirement saving and build the right assets for them that can make their future secure.
ASC is capable of maintaining close relationships with clients, which is essential to providing customized services. It conducts face-to-face meetings with businesses and participants in Guam and its adjacent islands, which is a crucial step toward building trust. Even during the pandemic that restricted in-person meetings, it utilized Zoom calls and Microsoft Teams to maintain client relationships.
Continuously Upping the Ante
ASC realizes that the investment landscape is evolving rapidly, and the rate of return for investors has significantly reduced in the past few years. Given this situation, it is important to eliminate traditional standardized employee communication and engage with participants on a more personal level. ASC engages in one-on-one conversations with participants to offer the right plan that aligns with their personal aspirations.
It also focuses on behavioral finance to better understand the rationality of humans and financial markets (i.e., why bad investment decisions are made). Consequentially, ASC always works to serve clients’ best interests and helps them undertake more logical decisions that ensure better outcomes in the future.
For instance, one of ASC’s clients needed a solution for low employee participation in their plan. They had tried everything but could not get their participation rate above 40%. Forcing auto enrollment seemed too stringent for their team to implement. ASC guided the employer to use auto enrollment with the message that there is no pressure to enroll, and employees could opt out later if they were not happy with the savings benefit. By focusing on the concern of employees but also advising and using behavioral finance, enrollment immediately increased to 80%+ and has stayed at this rate for over ten years.
This capability to understand the nature of the workforce and bring a solution to the table accordingly is rare in the industry.
“Our goal is to help people in Micronesia understand the importance of retirement saving and build the right assets that can make their future secure,” says Candy Okuhama, CEO of ASC. “We perceive ourselves as a community corporation that takes care of all stakeholders, including our staff, participants, shareholders, and partners.”
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As a full-service company, we handle everything, from plan documents and administration to tax reporting, compliance work, employee meetings, education.
The Focus on Challenging the Status Quo
ASC has always challenged existing standards to ensure the best possible outcomes for clients. From being the first company in Micronesia to offer retirement plan management services to investing in cutting-edge technology, it has traversed a long way. Even today, it is looking for new ways to serve clients with more efficiency. To achieve this, it listens to them and all the stakeholders and strives to improve its services based on the inputs. Although ASC still believes in having one-on- one, face-to-face conversations with clients, it never hesitates to adopt technology to reach a larger clientele.
The biggest contributor to ASC’s success is its team of experts. They know the investment landscape and engage with clients on a personal level. The team is always ready to drive the best possible outcomes for organizations and participants.
Its local presence, coupled with the ability to respect the need of each client, has enabled ASC to maintain its leadership position in the market for the past three decades. In the coming years, it will take numerous robust measures to serve clients with higher efficiency across other geographic locations.
