Church Plan Documents

[Guest Pension Girl]

Does anyone know what the status of church plan documents will be under the new 403b prototype program? For church plans under Code Section 3121 and QCCO's, it appears they cannot use the proposed prototype document. And what if the plan is funded using with a 403(b)(9) Retirement Income Account where a plan document IS required? What document should they use? Will all Church plans need to use custom attorney drafted documents?

Thanks

[Peter Gulia]

Beyond a question about whether a plan could or couldn’t fit into a prototype, a church should prefer to use “custom” documents (if the church prefers that its plan be one that has not elected to be governed by ERISA and that maintains all conditions for church plan treatment).

As someone who has written documents for several church plans, it’s no small project to say everything that a church plan should say and, more importantly, make sure not to say anything that the church plan should not say.

In addition to getting documents, a plan sponsor should care about what assurance stands behind this. Even if an insurer or custodian furnishes church plan documents, how confident is the plan sponsor that it would succeed in making that business legally responsible for a defect in a document?

[Guest Pension Girl]

Beyond a question about whether a plan could or couldn’t fit into a prototype, a church should prefer to use “custom” documents (if the church prefers that its plan be one that has not elected to be governed by ERISA and that maintains all conditions for church plan treatment).

As someone who has written documents for several church plans, it’s no small project to say everything that a church plan should say and, more importantly, make sure not to say anything that the church plan should not say.

In addition to getting documents, a plan sponsor should care about what assurance stands behind this. Even if an insurer or custodian furnishes church plan documents, how confident is the plan sponsor that it would succeed in making that business legally responsible for a defect in a document?

Do you provide document services, and on what basis?