Guideline accepts ACH transfers for both invoice payments and contribution collections. Alternatively, you can choose to use a credit card for invoice billing. We do not accept cash or check payments at this time. Therefore, we require companies to keep an active credit card or verified bank account on file for payments.
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You can add one credit card and up to four verified bank accounts for your company, each of which can be designated for a specific use. For example, one bank account could be used for 401(k) contributions and a different one could be used for monthly invoice payments to Guideline.
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You can learn how to add, edit or remove a bank account or credit card here.
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Billing will start the month following your plan’s start date and will be retroactive. For example, your February invoice will reflect the charges for the month of January, your March invoice will reflect the charges for your plan for the month of February, and so on.

On the first of every month, we will email you your invoice. Guideline will then pull the invoiced amount from your designated credit card or bank account around the 5th of that month.

If you choose to pay from a bank account, your payment will be processed via an ACH transaction within several days. Overall, the ACH billing process should take around 8-10 business days. If you choose to pay with a credit card, your payment will be processed automatically to your credit card provider.

Because Guideline uses different vendors to process payments, the codes displayed for our invoices and contribution collections may not specifically reference Guideline 401(k).

Instead, you may see a variation of WFMSTRIPE1 for invoice payments and SSBTrustOps for contribution withdrawals on your credit card or banking statements. Rest assured, these transactions are related to billing for your Guideline 401(k) plan.
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Guideline offers 3 pricing plans, with different costs and features. Here are the base fees for each of our pricing plan options:

You can learn more about our various 401(k) pricing plans and features here.
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In addition to the monthly base fee, Guideline also charges plan sponsors a recurring monthly fee¹ for each active participant:

Total fees are calculated based on the number of active participants during the month in which the participant fee is being charged.
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For purposes of calculating monthly participant fees, the following employees will not be considered “active participants” subject to billing:

At Guideline, we’ve done away with separate transaction fees. This means you won't pay 5500 filing preparation² or plan termination fees³, and your employees can avoid distribution, loan, and rollover fees.
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You can learn about our 401(k) fees for participants here.
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For more information on all fees, please refer to Guideline’s Form ADV 2A Brochure and Fee Disclosure, also available in Client Privacy Policy & Terms of Service within the Resource Library. Note that Guideline may charge for extraordinary service fees in certain circumstances.
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​¹ Pricing tiers and participant fees reflect packages announced October 2, 2023. Existing Guideline plans may have access to legacy pricing.
​² Third-party auditor fees will apply to large plans where a 5500 audit is required. These fees are not charged by Guideline.
​³ Guideline does not charge additional fees to close the plan, but the plan sponsor is responsible for paying the monthly fees until the plan has been terminated in accordance with applicable law, or until the plan has been transferred in full to another service provider.