414(s) Compensation

[Guest Mike Schwing]

A plan defines compensation as W-2 wages but excludes OT / bonus / commisions / & reimbursements & other expense allowances...

On the basis of the exclusion of OT, bonus & commissions the disparity for the comp ratio test is 30% - HCE - 90% NHCE 60%

If I amend the plan to test using gross comp. can should I still exclude the "reimbursement & other expense allowance" which by itself is not discriminatory?

2nd. Can I rate group test the profit sharing allocation to see if it would pass.. ie. allocate the profit sharing net of all the exclusions but test it on the gross compensation. It may pass this way as two of the HCE's are children of the owner and this is a cross tested plan where the kids are in their own group and do not get a contribution even though they are eligible.

[Guest Bud]

I think if you cross test the plan using a nondiscriminatory defintion of comp (and pass), you don't need to test the definition of compensation. You could make allocations based anything. It doesn't have to be based on compensation. If your plan based allocations on Rich Gannon's completed passing percentage or Shaq's free throw percentage (a bad year for participants), that should be fine as long as the plan passes the general test.