
Captain401 (YC S15) raises $3.5M to help more businesses offer a 401k - greattypo
http://blogs.wsj.com/venturecapital/2016/02/24/captain401-raises-3-5-million-to-help-small-business-employees-save-for-retirement/
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astrowilliam
I interviewed with these guys! I've spoken with one of the founders, Roger
Lee, at length about their product and I have to say that they are amazing
people with great vision. Even though I didn't get the gig, it's great to see
them doing well! Good things happen to good people.

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tyh
Roger is a real smart guy. I know because I went to summer camp with him years
ago.

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astrowilliam
He's very smart, and a good dude. I'm happy to have had the opportunity to
have him in my world for the brief time that we were talking. I could only
imagine the camping shenanigans he got into!

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tyre
We're a Captain401 user at Seneca Systems and it is fantastic.

We can offer a 401k program despite being a small company plus they integrate
with Gusto so I have to do nothing to actively maintain it.

#TheDream

As a founder, this goes beyond just another benefit. Supporting your
employees' long-term financial future is really important. Maybe early
employees make a few hundred million, but far more likely your company will
fail. In that case, they shouldn't have lost years of savings potential.

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sguha
[https://captain401.com/pricing](https://captain401.com/pricing)

How do these financial services justify charging a percentage of the funds
managed? Is there more work involved in handling an account with a larger
balance?

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harryh
Jesus those fees are high. 50 basis points to just warehouse the money.
Wealthfront charges half of that for some moderately sophisticated management.

Plus even more on the employer side! Wow.

And people say they are cheaper than other 401k providers? That's nuts.

EDIT: OK, it appears
([https://captain401.com/investments](https://captain401.com/investments))
that they will optionally do some automatic rebalancing for you so they're a
bit more than just a warehouse but still.

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phunge
This is 100% true. Mainstream 401k fees are out of control. I don't know how
much is opportunism and how much is regulatory burden, but parity to
wealthfront or anything else retail would be fucking miraculous.

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toomuchtodo
It would be amazing if Congress eliminated 401ks, and brought over the
employer contribution feature as well as the increased participant
contribution limits to IRAs. The only reason asset managers get away with
charging such outrageous fees is because you're a captive audience with your
401k.

Make them portable such that an IRA is and watch the fees fall.

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SilasX
Great that they're doing this! I especially like their philosophy here [1]
about favoring index funds. Way, way too many employers give you a poor
selection, loaded with actively-managed ones -- my last major employer did.

(Even better would be for the law to not limit employee 401k choices to ones
selected by the employer, based on some misguided belief that they benefit
from having the same choices as the "highly paid employees", as required by
the 401 code, given that those very executives don't actually rely on 401ks
for retirement and thus have little incentive to get the choices right ... but
hey, you gotta work with what you have.)

[1] [https://captain401.com/investments](https://captain401.com/investments)

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brobinson
Awesome team and product! Paul is a great guy. I was interviewing there, but
sadly the position I was applying for was filled. :(

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greattypo
This is awesome. I've experienced first hand the hassle of setting up a 401k
for employees (and now appreciate why so many companies don't offer it until
they're bigger). In my mind, it would be a strictly better world where all
companies could offer this benefit.

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harryh
I wish the law was rewritten so that this sort of savings benefit wasn't tied
into your employer having to set it up. Get rid of 401ks and just raise the
damn IRA limit.

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toomuchtodo
I regret having only one upvote. This is the way the problem gets fixed.

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harryh
Unfortunately I think the chances of this happening in the foreseeable future
are quite slim. Alas.

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nugget
Great team, great product. Highly recommended.

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bradleyjg
Their pricing looks very good. But very small companies may also want to look
into SIMPLE IRAs. They are less flexible in terms of employer contribution
options (basically 3% match to a max of $12.5k or 2% unconditional to a max of
$5,300) and have lower employee contribution limits ($12.5k) but involve far
less paperwork and tend to have considerably lower fees.

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kellysutton
Our company uses Captain401. It's great!

