# How to read a record — U.S. employers whose benefit plan filed a final Form 5500

> What the record is, what the status means, and what is left out.

## How to read these records

### Which employers

Four tests, all from the Form 5500 and 5500-SF files for 2024: the filing is marked as the final return; the plan
is a single-employer plan; it had 50 participants or more at the start of the year; and no other plan filed under the
same employer number that year was still continuing.

### A final return is not a closure notice

It says the plan ended. Companies that shut down file one; so do companies that were bought and moved their staff
to the buyer's plan, and companies that simply dropped a plan. The record cannot tell these apart.

### Participants are not headcount

The count includes former employees who still had a balance. “Active participants at the end” is usually zero on
a final return: the plan has paid everyone out.

### What is not here

Names of signers, administrators or any individual. Mailing addresses. Health-care employers and public bodies.
Plans of fewer than 50 participants. Multiemployer and union plans.

**Do you control the records of a company that has closed?**

The internal data of a company that employed 50 people or more (Slack or Microsoft Teams archive, documentation, project histories) may still have value after it has stopped operating.

[Check whether this company’s data qualifies →](/pro.md) We are paid by the buyer if a partnership is signed, never by the company. Whether personal data in those archives can be transferred is a legal question for whoever controls them. Not affiliated with the U.S. Department of Labor.

---

Página: https://final-form-5500-employer-records.pages.dev/how-to-read/
Fonte: https://www.dol.gov/agencies/ebsa/about-ebsa/our-activities/public-disclosure/foia/form-5500-datasets
Recolha: 2026-09-30