T. Rowe Price Latest to Adopt SmartDollar Financial Wellness

T. Rowe Price announced that Ramsey Solutions’ SmartDollar will soon be available for integration into the Retire With Confidence program.

Upon plan sponsor election, participants will have access to SmartDollar’s online tools and interactive lessons “designed to help them pursue a better path to retirement readiness.” Full-service recordkeeping clients will be able to deliver the service to participants as soon as April 2016, according to T. Rowe Price.

Diana Awed, head of product and marketing for T. Rowe Price Retirement Plan Services, says the addition of SmartDollar adds to the firm’s multi-channel approach to financial wellness and will “encourage employees to address their financial and budgeting needs, and ultimately help them build a stronger financial foundation.”

Speaking with PLANADVISER last year, Ramsey explained the SmartDollar program as “a common-sense approach about making and sticking to a budget, eliminating debt and building, at least initially, a $1,000 emergency fund. These are at the root of the program.”

With the announcement that T. Rowe Price would add SmartDollar, Brian Hamilton, vice president of Financial Wellness for Ramsey Solutions, adds that building emergency savings is key because it “frees up an individual’s largest wealth-building tool: their income. With so many Americans living paycheck to paycheck, it’s no wonder that participants are not on track for retirement.”

More information on T. Rowe Price’s Retire With Confidence and the SmartDollar integration is here. LPL Financial was an early retirement adviser to adopt SmartDollar as a client deliverable, along with retirement plan administrator Fifth Third Bank.