On September 21, 2015, the IRS announced a new Form 5500 compliance project focusing on plan years ending in 2011, as detailed below. Plan sponsors should ensure that all required Form 5500s have been filed and respond to any notice received from the Employee Plans Compliance Unit. Background Federal law requires most retirement plans to
In Announcement 2015-19, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) announced changes to the Employee Plans Determination Letter Program. This announcement describes important changes to the Employee Plans determination letter program for qualified retirement plans. Based on the need of the Internal Revenue Service to more efficiently direct its limited resources, effective January 1, 2017, these changes
Notice 2015-49, Use of Lump Sum Payments to Replace Lifetime Income Being Received By Retirees Under Defined Benefit Pension Plans, informs taxpayers that the Treasury Department and the IRS intend to amend the required minimum distribution regulations under § 401(a)(9) of the Internal Revenue Code to address the use of lump sum payments to replace
As expected, the FASB proposed three Accounting Standards Updates (ASUs) aimed at simplifying accounting for employee benefit plans. According to the AICPA Journal of Accountancy, the updates were the result of consensuses of FASB’s Emerging Issues Task Force. The three proposed ASUs for plan accounting were included in one exposure draft: Proposed ASU, Plan Accounting: Defined
On April 14, 2015, the U.S. Department of Labor has released a proposed rule that they believe will protect 401(k) and IRA investors by mitigating the effect of conflicts of interest in the retirement investment marketplace. A White House Council of Economic Advisers analysis found that these conflicts of interest result in annual losses of about 1
The Employee Plans Compliance Resolution System (“EPCRS”) sets forth a comprehensive system of correction programs for sponsors of retirement plans that are intended to satisfy the requirements of § 401(a), 403(a), 403(b), 408(k), or 408(p) of the Internal Revenue Code (“Code”), but that have failed to meet those requirements for a period of time. The
The Employee Plans Compliance Unit (EPCU) conducted a Voluntary Compliance Follow-Up project to determine if plan sponsors completed the corrections they agreed to in their Voluntary Correction Program (VCP) compliance statements. When you find errors in your plan’s form or operation, the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) encourage you to fix them using one of their