BPAS reaches $125M in revenue as it commemorates 50th year

UTICA, N.Y. — As it celebrates a half century of doing business, Benefit Plans Administrative Services (BPAS) has grown into a $125 million revenue company, with much of that growth occurring in the last two decades.

The national provider of retirement plans, benefit plans, fund administration, and institutional trust services marked its 50th anniversary in May and says it is celebrating with clients and the community throughout the year.

In the months ahead, BPAS will release a series of videos on the company’s website and social-media channels featuring interviews with some of the company’s key employees from the past and present talking about the company’s history and future.

Jerry Mayer, now 84, started BPAS from his Utica home back when retirement plans were administered on paper and his teenage daughter was one of his first employees. Mayer grew the business through the 1980s, when he and his brother had to write their own software to handle the growing requirements of the business, the company says.

“I am an optimist,” Mayer said in a BPAS press release. “We built our firm with integrity and with good people. The people we hired really mattered to us, and the clients we worked with did, too.”

DeWitt–based Community Bank System, Inc. (NYSE: CBU) acquired BPAS in 1996. Barry Kublin spearheaded the transaction and then led the company’s growth during his tenure as CEO until he retired in 2021. Paul Neveu replaced him as BPAS CEO that year.

“We never defined ourselves as qualified benefit-plan administrators,” Kublin said. “Rather, we defined ourselves by our people, technology capabilities, and market opportunities.

BPAS has been on quite the growth trajectory since joining Community Bank System.

Mark Tryniski, Community Bank System CEO and president, noted, “When I started with the bank in 2003, the revenues of BPAS were somewhere in the $13 million range, and today it’s a $125 million dollar business. So it’s been a tremendous story of growth and success. But it’s also a story that starts and ends with the fact that we care for our clients, and we care for each other. It’s our culture that has made this company thrive.”

Today, BPAS supports more than 4,500 retirement plans with $110 billion in trust assets and $1.3 trillion in fund administration.

Along with its Utica office in a business park, BPAS has offices in Buffalo, Manhattan, Rochester, and Syracuse, New York; as well as Boston, Massachusetts; Houston, Texas; Minneapolis, Minnesota; Parsippany, New Jersey; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Sioux Falls, South Dakota; Spokane, Washington; and San Juan, Puerto Rico.

BPAS employs 410 people and serves more than 620,000 participants across the U.S. with services including workplace retirement plans, actuarial and pension, health-benefit consulting, IRA, VEBA HRA, health and welfare plans, fiduciary, collective-investment funds, fund administration, and institutional trust.