If you have a pre-approved defined benefit plan, you may recall that your plan was rewritten sometime between May 1, 2010, and April 30, 2012. At that time, we told you that another restatement would not be required for at least six years. It may be hard to believe, but six years has already passed. If your defined benefit plan is currently on a pre-approved document or if you want to start using a pre-approved document, it is time to begin the plan restatement process.
Remedial Amendment Period Cycles
The IRS established a cyclical filing system that requires defined benefit plans maintained on pre-approved documents to be restated once every six years. The IRS has announced that the second restatement period under that program for pre-approved defined benefit plans opened May 1, 2018, and closes April 30, 2020. That means if your defined benefit plan is maintained on the Warner Norcross + Judd LLP pre-approved volume submitter plan or your plan is maintained on another pre-approved plan document, you must restate your plan no later than April 30, 2020.
What Is a Pre-Approved Plan?
A pre-approved volume submitter plan consists of plan language, including extensive optional language, that is submitted for IRS approval and then used to create employer plans. The new defined benefit pre-approved volume submitter plan that Warner Norcross + Judd LLP sponsors has thousands of choices to allow for flexibility and customization. More information on the benefits of the Warner Norcross + Judd LLP pre-approved volume submitter document is available here.
In addition, maintaining a defined benefit plan on a pre-approved volume submitter document is now more valuable given recent changes in the law. The IRS no longer issues determination letters to ongoing individually designed plans, but it continues to review and issue determination letters to defined benefit plans maintained on a pre-approved volume submitter document. We expect almost all defined benefit plans maintained on the Warner pre-approved volume submitter document to be eligible to submit to the IRS for an individual determination letter.
Next Steps
If you would like to discuss restating your defined benefit plan on—or converting your defined benefit plan to—our new pre-approved volume submitter plan, please contact any of our retirement plan attorneys, who are listed below. If you are a current Warner client who uses a defined benefit plan document drafted by our team, we expect to be in touch with you to discuss updating your plan. In the meantime, please feel free to reach out to us.