401K is there a way to combine old with the New and How!?

[M_Smart007]

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@CreditInspired wrote:

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@Girlzilla88 wrote:

Or is there a way to look up all the places I have been hired at or was at for over 3 months etc...That could possibly be helpful as well?!

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Hi there

Social Security will have every single employer you've worked for in which income was reported. 

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+1

Possibly LexisNexis to

[Revelate]

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@CreditInspired wrote:

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@Girlzilla88 wrote:

Or is there a way to look up all the places I have been hired at or was at for over 3 months etc...That could possibly be helpful as well?!

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Hi there

Social Security will have every single employer you've worked for in which income was reported. 

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It does?  I haven't seen that in the mySSA interface but admittedly I haven't looked that hard.

The only way I knew of would be to request the full document tax transcripts from the IRS which should include W2's and what not, but I don't know how far back they go. 

I never had a problem remembering who I've worked for so wouldn't be a big surprise to me but I'd be kinda curious to see anyway if there's an easy way via SSA.

[tacpoly]

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@Girlzilla88 wrote:

But if you do not know which of your previous employers had a 401k set up for you is there a way to find that out I think it would be easy to ask that of the last job but I'm trying to find back to 14  or 15 years of employment history I know I am WAAAAYYYYYYYY late on this train but I didn't even acknowledge my credit until 2018 so I'm trying to get a better understanding of other aspects since I have a better understanding on the credit side now.      

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I've worked for 5 companies in the past 25 years.  How many companies do you estimate you need to identify?  And did you actually enroll in (and fund) a 401k plan at each and every company?  It has only been recently that some companies started automatic 401k enrollment...

[CreditInspired]

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@Revelate wrote:

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@CreditInspired wrote:

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@Girlzilla88 wrote:

Or is there a way to look up all the places I have been hired at or was at for over 3 months etc...That could possibly be helpful as well?!

---

Hi there

Social Security will have every single employer you've worked for in which income was reported. 

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It does?  I haven't seen that in the mySSA interface but admittedly I haven't looked that hard.

The only way I knew of would be to request the full document tax transcripts from the IRS which should include W2's and what not, but I don't know how far back they go. 

I never had a problem remembering who I've worked for so wouldn't be a big surprise to me but I'd be kinda curious to see anyway if there's an easy way via SSA.

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Now granted, I started getting this annually when I turned 50 until I turned 65. And every employer (including income earned) starting from my first employer up to the present were on there. It was great too because any inaccuracies could be reported prior to retirement.

So since SS has this info, I would be surprised if one could not request it prior to age 50. 

[Nomad3]

Yeah previous tax returns seems like a good place to check out. Out of curiosity how many possible employers are we talking about? Were they temp/short contract positions or potential "career" positions? Auto-enroll 401k sometimes has a probationary period after hired before you are enrolled, sometimes 3mo.

But generally you have to do some setup with 401ks right? I get emailed about new statements ready to view, is it possible you have some in a spam folder or something?

[iced]

One additional note I'd add to this discussion regarding rollovers:

If you rollover a previous employer's plan into your current employer's plan, those funds are immediately subject to the same rules your current employer imposes on your 401k plan. In practical terms, this means you can only invest in funds that your current employer allows and if you cannot withdraw/loan money from your current employer's plan, you will lose that ability as well on your rollover funds (not that you should ever, ever withdraw or borrow from your 401k).

If you're talking about small amounts here - thousands or tens of thousands - this is likely a non-issue as there isn't much there in the first place. If you're rolling over hundreds of thousands or more, the first issue can be of particular importantance. You will likely see lower management fees with your employer's plan versus an IRA, but depending on your employer, you may have significantly more options to invest in with an IRA than you would the 401k plan.

[Girlzilla88]

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@CreditInspired wrote:

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@Girlzilla88 wrote:

Or is there a way to look up all the places I have been hired at or was at for over 3 months etc...That could possibly be helpful as well?!

---

Hi there

Social Security will have every single employer you've worked for in which income was reported. 

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Sweeeeeeeeet

[Girlzilla88]

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@tacpoly wrote:

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@Girlzilla88 wrote:

But if you do not know which of your previous employers had a 401k set up for you is there a way to find that out I think it would be easy to ask that of the last job but I'm trying to find back to 14  or 15 years of employment history I know I am WAAAAYYYYYYYY late on this train but I didn't even acknowledge my credit until 2018 so I'm trying to get a better understanding of other aspects since I have a better understanding on the credit side now.      

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I've worked for 5 companies in the past 25 years.  How many companies do you estimate you need to identify?  And did you actually enroll in (and fund) a 401k plan at each and every company?  It has only been recently that some companies started automatic 401k enrollment...

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I have worked for a LOT more than 5 places over the past 15 years haha not trying to be funny but it is what it is.     I have no idea most of the time when I filled out paperwork they just said this is mandatory and you do it.     So I'm not sure which if any was for a 401k Hell I didn't even learn I had earnings in a 401k until last year which is sad enough as it is.      But that's why I'm trying to understand everything I can before I get older and I'm really SOL

[Girlzilla88]

I really really wish our schools would have taught us about Credit, Taxes, 401 Savings, Home Buying etc but that was skipped for me and a lot of others

[Nomad3]

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@Girlzilla88 wrote:

I really really wish our schools would have taught us about Credit, Taxes, 401 Savings, Home Buying etc but that was skipped for me and a lot of others

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Yeah, my economics class (where this would potentially be taught) was taught by a football coach and the gist of the class was go to a new restaurant and write a review of it 1 page long. Coach didn't even read the papers, if it was 1 page long you got a 100, I got a 70 for being one line short of a full page. We also watched a lot of movies.