The Illinois Department of Central Management Services decided to switch from the experienced and easy to deal with T. Rowe Price to an outfit in Colorado called Empower last July.

Today I am reminded of the furstration for the user-unfriendly rules that Empower mandates.

I had a simple request–send me a check for $10,000 from my 457 Deferred Comp account to be deposited in an IRA at my bank.

My desire was that the assets in the Defferd Comp account would be redeemed this afternoon after the marketrs closed.

That was not possible, however.

First I had to sign with pen on paper.

Empower said it would mail the form with Social Security number and address already filled in.

But it might take five days to get here in the mail.

Then, presumeably, it would take five days for the form to be returned.

Then, almost two weeks from now, Empower would sell my stocks, cash in my bonds and mail the check…which might take ten days, according to the script being read, to reach me.

What will the market and interest rate be almost two weeks from now.

Neither I nor Empower know, but that’s when my assets will be cashed in.

I’m making the call when the Dow is at about $33,500.

What will it be two weeks from now?

Empower and, obviously, the Department of Central Management Services doesn’t know and doesn’t care.

Empower will get a $25 fee and CMS, having off-loaded the administrative responsibility to a no-name firm has washed its hands of the situation. (Only an accidental reference to Good Friday, when Empower employees will be working only part of the day.)

I was offered another alternative.

Empower could email me the form.

Great, but I don’t have a printer.

“Could I sign it electronically?” I asked.

The answer was “No.”

I finally asked if the woman, whose name I did not record, would email me the completed form.

She said she did, but it never arrived.

I had to call again and start from the beginning with Jessica, who was as helpful as she could be under the really stupid, not to mention outdated rules her employer Empower imposes.

Jessica emailed me the blank forms and I got a sense of Déjà Vu.

It was the same twenty-eight page email I got last summer when I tried to withdraw money from my 457 account.

I was so disgusted I was thinking about writing a column then, but didn’t get around to it.

And I didn’t follow through on my desired transfer to an Individual Retirement Account.

In November, to my utter surprise, Empower sent a check for the entire IRS required minimum distribution.

No notice.

No approval.

No matter that I had already taken the full amount while T. Rowe Price was compentently handling State government’s 457 plan.

It still disgusts me that so much paperwork should be required to withdraw money when it was so easy with T. Rowe Price.

Just a phone call.

I again asked if I could sign electronically, as with every other financial institutioin I deal with allows.

“They ask for a wet signature on the form,” Jessica replied.

“Can I email it (the signed paper document) back?” I asked.

“No, there isn’t a way to email it back,” Jessica explained.

She said I could Fax it back and provided the Fax number.

She explained the Fax number was not on the form (so strange), so I wrote it down.

I asked if I Faxed it inday, if my assets would be cashed in this afternoon.

“I can’t guarantee that,” she said.

“It usually takes a little time to process a paper form.”

“So, I have to roll the dice on what will happen over the Easter Weekend?” I asked.

“That’s right.”

She filled out the form I had to sign with a pen and emailed it to me, saying it would take about 15 minutes.

It took much, much longer.

She waited on the phone with me; the whole call probably took forty-five minutes.

Jessica did tell me I could upload images of the signed form to the Empower website and was patient enough to walk me through the process.

I went to the Empower website and it appearesd I had already signed up–log-ins appeared.

But Jessica could see nothing on her end, so she walked me through the process.

The first message I saw was “You have exceeded the [time allowed].” It said I could try again Monday.

She sent me a special number, which took a long time to show up

Once I got it and gained access to the portal, I found something interesting.

I know I had designed my wife a my beneficiary, but information on her was requested.

Guess what I found under the catefory “Gender:”

• Unspecified
• Female
• Male
• Non-Binany

The two calls expended one-third of my cell phone’s battrery power.

So, when will I receive a check I can deposit in my bank IRA?

Your guess is as good as mine.

Back when I headed the CMC Bureau of Benefits in the Thompson Administration, Deferred Comp was one of my divisions.

I would never have put State employees and retirees into a situation like this.