Was buying a house this previous summer. Opted to zero out my 401k for 4 months in order to increase liquidity. Was told by my local HR that our company did a "true up" at end of year. Took her statement on faith.
Long story short, screwed myself out of 4 months of company match totaling $2300.
Weirdly, she was right, but not. All of her anecdotal data was from various workers who had maxed out the 401k early (say in October). As long as they didn't go into their benefits, and zero out their 401k percentage, the company would look at their percentage of contribution as being valid, even if their actual contribution was zero because of earlier maxing out.
But in my case, I zero'd out, missed those contributions, then maxed it out in the last quarter.
argh.