One single employer plan is merged into another. Must the amendment for this merger be signed prior to the effective date of the merger? How about before the end of the plan year in which the merger takes place or retroactively during the following plan year. The 5310-A's will have been filed in a timely manner.

What if a board resolution regarding the merger is passed prior to merger. Does this allow for any type of retroactive amendment?

4041.28(4) addresses "participating annuity contracts" with regard to terminating a DB plan. I have only dealt with nonparticipating annuities so it is unclear to me what is involved with a "participating anuuity contract". The plan will have no residual assets. How does the participating contract work?

My wife and I each made (Schwab) $2000 Roth IRA contributions for 1999 and, as it turned out, we were ineligible. Due to a lack of knowledge on my part, we left the money in there and paid the IRS penalty. She also added $2000 to her Roth account back in January for tax year 2000 and we won't be eligible again this year. Am I best off having her sell the equities she purchased and transfer the cash into a standard IRA account? I assume that by doing this we will reduce the amount of associated penalties that we have to pay. We would just continue to pay the penalties from our 1999 investment. Thanks for any advice.

COBRA regs say that COBRA ends if, after the election period you become covered under another healthcare plan. We seperate out our medical from our dental. That means you can elect COBRA for medical only, dental only or a combination of both. If you elect dental only, or medical and dental and subsequently become covered under an employer sponsored medical plan but have no dental coverage there... must you terminate the dental portion also? If you elect dental only and the administrator finds out you have become covered under a medical plan, do you see a requirement to terminate the dental COBRA? Have others incurred this type of event. I am curious as to how other employers handle this.

I am looking for a bundled provider for davis Bacon Plans. Does anybody know of any? Please help!

Do you need to file a Schedule H for a fully insured welfare plan which consists of group medical, group dental and group term life? All funds went directly to the insurance company. Nothing was self-funded. Thanks.

Assume a trust is the beneficary of three seperate IRA's. The trust is "qualified" such that the ben. of the trust are the desg. ben. of the IRA's. Spouse is one of the ben's of the trust. Assume IRA owner dies.

Q1:

Other than various PLR's, does anyone have any citations as to under what circumstances a spouse would qualify for a spousal rollover? (Having read various PLR's on this topic they tend to use the same language in describing the terms the spouse needs to satisfy).

Q2:

Does it make a diffence, in general, if a spousal rollover goes into a new IRA account or it is rolled over into a pre-existing IRA account of the surviving spouse. If there is a difference, what is it?

Thanks

Can a company contribute, as a corporate contribution to the company's qualified profit sharing plan, the stock of a publicly traded company (not related). The corporation owns the stock and they want to "transfer" it to the plan as a company contribution. They would record it on the corporate books at the market value on the date of transfer, realizing any gain/loss for tax purposes. The company wants to avoid the transaction costs of selling the stock and buying it again for the pension trust.

Does anyone know of any provision limiting the "quarterly" repayment requirement to calendar quarters only? For instance, if a loan was made in December 10, could the first quarterly payment be due on February 10? Or is the initial "quarterly" payment due December 31?

A descretionary profit sharing contribution was made to the plan in March and described as a contribution for the current year. The sponsor really took it on the chin this year and would like to re-classify said contribution on its year end financial statements as a contribution for next year.

Can this be done?

Company A changes from a quarterly balance forward method of accounting to daily recordkeeping. During the blackout, like funds were used. Of 800 participants, about 100 did not have their balances put in the proper like funds. Some made money, some lost. The new recordkeeper wants to correct by puting everyone where they should have been when the error was discovered. This involves taking money away from some and reallocating. Does anyone see a fiduciary issue removing money from the account balances of those who were unjustly enriched. I don't, but thought I would ask.

Can a money purchase plan provide for the following formula: 5.7% integrated formula; provided that each HCE physician in his/her first year of participation is limited to a $500 allocation, and each HCE physician in his/her second year of participation is limited to a $2,500 allocation? Doctors in their first couple of years of practice need as much $ in cash, so they asked regarding limiting allocations during these years.

I don't think there's a discrimination problem because its limited to HCEs, but is there something I'm missing?

I have had two situations this year where the value of clients converted Roth IRA has dropped significantly. In one case, the conversion was made at $30,000 of value, reporting $7,500 of income per year for 4 years and now in year two, the total value of the Roth is $9,000. Does the taxpayer still have to report the full $30,000, and when, if at all, does the taxpayer take a tax loss and, if so, what type of loss would it be. I see no discussion of this type of situation in any literature.

Anyone know where I can obtain IRS Announcement 95-99?

Can a waiver of participation be revoked by the participant? I'm looking at a form that is titled "Election not to Participate". The last paragraph of the form states that the election will remain in effect until the participant revokes the election. I thought that a waiver of participation had to be non-revokable.

Also, if there is a valid waiver of participation, is the participant included in the ADP test? 410(B) test?

I made a $2000 Roth Contribution this year for Tax year 1999, and an additional $2000 for tax year 2000. I have recently discovered that I will be above the allowable income limits for contributing, and will therefore have to take $2000 out of my account for Tax year 2000.

With the $4000, I bought 80 shares of a stock that is now worth under $2000. Can I transfer those shares out of my Roth, or do I have to sell them first, and transfer cash? If I can transfer stock, how many of the shares can I transfer (what part needs to add up to $2000, my cost basis, or what they are worth now?) Will I be able to take advantage of the losses for tax purposes? Finally I have some other losses from stock that I bought several years ago in my Roth account. Can I transfer those shares to satisfy the excess contribution even though I bought them several years ago, and if so, can I take advantage of those losses.

Any help is appreciated.

We have 3 nephews (the oldest is 7) whom we'd like to help financially with college when they're 18. We are planning on opening taxable accounts in our name, and making a series of gifts when they graduate high school. Keeping the accounts in our name will exclude them from financial aid applications, although the redemptions will trigger tax penalties for us. We've been told that Roth IRA's in the student's name may not be required on a financial aid application. If true, this would greatly change our family support strategy. Can anyone set the record straight on this?

Is it sufficient for NQ deferred compensation plan drafting purposes that the contribution formula be defined as an amount equal to the difference between (1) 10% of the participant's compensation, and (2)the percentage of compensation allocated on the participant's behalf as a matching contribution under the employer's qualified 401(k) PSP [irrespective of any later corrections or changes to the match as a result of ACP testing]?

Can an employee enter into a sufficently specific salary deferral agreement prior to each plan year, with the contribution expressed in such terms??

Although I saw this question discussed in previous postings, they are a bit old. I am seeking any up-to date info on the requirements for initial COBRA notices, which I understand to be notices provided upon entry into the plan.

Our SPD's contain an extensive COBRA chapter and are provided to all members. Is this sufficient under the current regs?

I noticed some people considered distribution of the SPD to the new member insufficient, on the grounds that the spouse might not see it. In the context of notices provided due to triggering events (loss of job, etc.), I was under the impression one notice mailed to the member's current address was sufficient, unless a dependent was known to reside at a different address.

As you have probably gathered, we do not send these initial notices, relying instead on distribution of the SPD.

Any opinions?

We have mandatory plan enrollment (participants cannot elect "No Coverage"), and participants with other comprehensive coverage typically take our $10,000 deductible Cat plan in order to take advantage of our liberal "cash back" allowance. When they lose their comprehensive coverage through their spouse, they want to switch to one of our higher-level plans. We permit them to add their spouse and/or other dependents, but do not permit plan changes. Searching for cites to HIPAA regs that would permit a participant to make a mid-year election change from a Catastrophic type health plan to a comprehensive plan, based on the occurrence of a qualifying status change event (eg. spouse loses coverage under other plan, birth of a child, etc.). We'd like to permit the change, if we could find something in the regs to "hang our hat" on. Thanks.