K Fi Foundation Burrito People!

K Fi Crew serving up breakfast

On February 16, the K Financial team spent the morning at one of our favorite “Spots” for community service events – The Spot in downtown Denver.  The Spot is an outreach center for homeless youth.  The K Fi Foundation contributed a variety of supplies and breakfast items for this event.  We dropped off 5 bags of goodness from the Spot’s wishlist, including blankets, long underwear, chap stick and t-shirts.  We also served up 50 Santiago’s breakfast burritos, juice and tons of apples, oranges and bananas.  We always meet some interesting and lively characters at these events.  One very large young lady asked if we had a hefty bag that she could use.  We located the bag for her, thinking that maybe she was going to help clean up around the Spot or otherwise put the bag to good use.  But instead she started loading up all of the fruit and other items that we brought.  It appeared that she was going to try to sell these items because she needed to know some specific information about them, such as what kind of apples we had brought and where they were from.  Luckily our friend Amy at the Spot talked the large young woman out of loading up her hefty bag so we had enough goodies for everyone.

Employee Benefit Plans DOL Criminal Enforcement Cases

The AICPA Employee Benefit Plan Audit Quality Center has developed a summary analysis of the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) Employee Benefit Security Administration’s criminal enforcement actions involving employee benefit plans during the period April 2009 through November 2011.  The summary includes actual fraud cases categorized by plan type.  This tool helps to demonstrate how fraud might be committed and concealed in a benefit plan.  Here is a link to a pdf of the tool:

DOL EBSA Criminal Case Summaries

Risk Appetite Guidance Published by COSO

The Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission (COSO) released a new thought paper aimed at helping organizations better articulate, develop, and implement “risk appetite.”  Enterprise Risk Management – Understanding and Communicating Risk Appetite is the latest in a series of COSO papers providing guidance on improving risk management.   While helping many of our clients develop and maintain ERM programs, we have found that risk appetite is one of the most challenging pieces of the ERM puzzle.  Risk appetite is the amount of risk organizations are willing to accept in pursuit of their objectives.  The COSO thought paper provides example statements of risk appetite and guidance on how companies can effectively develop and document risk appetite.  The concepts in the paper will be incorporated into K Financial’s ERM software in the coming months.  The COSO paper is available for free at www.coso.org.

K Fi Foundation Hosts 2nd Annual Christmas Party at the Kidney Center

On December 12, the K Financial team hosted one of its best events yet.  We spent the morning with our good friends at the Kidney Center in Denver Children’s Hospital having an excellent Christmas celebration.  We had a great time with the kids, trying to make their dialysis treatment a little different than they are used to and a lot of fun.  First we painted Christmas tree ornaments, then we decorated cookies and finally we opened presents.  The K Fi Foundation provided many DVD movies for the kids to watch during treatment and also gave them an iPad to use.  A big thank you to Lonny and Angie for coordinating this wonderful event!

(Side note: As he has done in the past, our colleague Daniel painted a very nice ornament and did a good job decorating cookies.)

Helpful Tool for Year End 401(k) Plan Review

Every year it is important for 401(k) plan administrators to review the requirements for their plan’s operation.  This annual review is a “best practice” that is often overlooked, but could save you time, money and headaches in the coming year.  The IRS has published a very helpful checklist to help you keep your plan in compliance with many of the important rules.  This tool helps you to find, fix and avoid the 10 most common mistakes that plan’s make.  We recommend you set aside a few hours before the end of the year to complete the checklist.  Your friends at K Financial are happy to help you with this if you can not fit it in before year end.  Click here for the IRS 401(k) Plan Checklist

K Fi Foundation Hits the Spot!

On November 3, 2011, the K Financial team delivered and served breakfast to homeless youth at the Urban Peak’s’ drop in center, “The Spot”.   The mission of Urban Peak is to help homeless youth overcome their challenges and become self-sufficient adults by providing essential services and a supportive community.  We served up 40 Santiago’s breakfast burritos, dozens of donuts, fruit and juice to the kids.  We also brought them 5 bags of supplies from their wish list, including soap, shampoo, deodorant and long underwear. 

The Spot was a much more controlled environment than what we have gotten used to the last few years when we distribute food, clothes and other items on the street in Denver.  On our last few visits to Denver we have been criticized by the police and business owners for drawing crowds of needy folks where we distribute our goods.  The Spot was a much more relaxed environment and we will definitely return there soon.  The “Poetry Room” where we were stationed was all brick with nice graffiti that reminded us of the old tv program 21 Jump Street.

Improving Internal Controls

Internal control improvements are often perceived as adding cost to an organization.  In fact, the argument against some control improvements is that the cost to implement them outweighs the benefits they create.  There are some control improvements, however, that have a high likelihood of generating true economic returns.