401(k) Monitor

Paychex 401(k) plans and fees

Source: Schedule C of Form 5500 filings, form year 2024, DOL EFAST2 bulk data · DOL EFAST2

Filings lag by design: a plan can file up to 9½ months after its year ends, so this is the newest data on file. Why filings lag

Paychex recordkeeps 539 of the 50,598 large 401(k) plans with an identified recordkeeper in form-year-2024 Form 5500 filings, a 1.1% plan share covering 335,887 participants.

$119.77

Median plan-paid administrative cost per participant across the 535 published plans recordkept by Paychex with computable fee data, form-year-2024 filings.

$2.40 below the $122.17 median across all 54,783 published plans with fee data.

How many 401(k) plans does Paychex recordkeep?

Universe figures from Schedule C across all form-year-2024 filings; published figures from the 539 plans on 401(k) Monitor naming Paychex. Assets and participants as filed.
Plans recordkept, full universeOf 50,598 form-year-2024 filings with an identified recordkeeper.539
Plan share1.1%
Participants in those plans335,887
Participant share0.4%
Plans published on 401(k) MonitorOf 57,824 plans published so far from the 57,824 in the form-year-2024 data.539
Participants in published plans335,887
Assets in published plans$4.7B

The published subset skews toward the largest plans, so its totals and medians do not describe the whole Paychex book. The universe counts do.

What do 401(k) plans recordkept by Paychex pay in fees?

The median plan-paid administrative cost across the 535 published plans recordkept by Paychex is $119.77 per participant, against $122.17 across all 54,783 published plans with fee data. 271 of the 535 (51%) pay less than that all-plans median.

These are plan-paid expenses from Schedule H only. Fees the sponsor pays directly, and fees embedded in fund expense ratios, never appear here, so every figure is a floor, not the all-in cost. The recordkeeper is one of several providers a plan pays. 4 of the 539 published plans report no computable plan-paid cost and are excluded from the median. How to read your own plan’s number: are your 401(k) fees high?

Which are the biggest 401(k) plans Paychex administers?

Each linked page shows the plan’s full fee breakdown and its percentile among plans of the same size.

Where do Paychex 401(k) participants log in?

Participants in a plan recordkept by Paychex manage their account at Paychex Flex.

If your employer has since changed recordkeepers, an old balance may not be there. The DOL’s Retirement Savings Lost & Found ↗ tracks accounts left behind.

Source

DatasetDOL EFAST2 Form 5500 bulk data (FOIA)
Form year2024
Recordkeeper identificationService code 15 or 64; the mapping from raw filing names to brands is ours.Schedule C, Part I, Item 2
Dataset last refreshedJuly 28, 2026

Bulk dataset at askebsa.dol.gov ↗ · How the recordkeeper is identified

Cite this page

401(k) Monitor, "Paychex 401(k) plans and fees", computed from DOL EFAST2 Form 5500 bulk data, form year 2024.