St. Jude Medical/Pacesetter 401(k) Plan System Errors May Affect Employees & x-Employees (433 hits )

June 12, 2010 - PRLog -- Former employee Fox developed medical device firmware at Pacesetter in Sylmar, CA for almost 10 years in the 90s. He was a prolific inventor and several of his  medical device US Utility patents are in St Jude's portfolio generating profits.
Between 2005 and 2009  St Jude Medical erroneously witheld $46k of Fox's retirement account.  According to SJM,  system errors associated with  "employee vesting percentages"  in the JP Morgan  and SJM  financial data base caused JP Morgan to erroneously forfeit $46k of Fox's 2005 distribution. Although SJM belatedly restored the funds in 2009, the process was flawed at every step. The inept performances of  sponsor and administrator  have been likened to a "Chinese Fire Drill".  Apparently there are incompatible versions of Lawson financial software in use and some sections of employee records (e.g.  "employee vesting percentage"  ) are inaccessible. As late as Dec 2008,  both JP Morgan & SJM benefits personnel have been unable to definitively determine Fox's vesting %.  Ultimately,  educated guesses had to be made by SJM.
Consequently, former employees who have taken 401K rollovers should carefully review their records and look closely at any 'forfeitures'.   Any other  former employees detecting signifigant errors in SJM's  401K administration are requested to notify Fox via email.