How can a participant's estate close if the DB plan insists on paying installments to the estate?

[katieinny]

A DB plan participant passed away without a spouse and no beneficiary designation form. The plan says that installment payments must be made to the participant's estate because the plan is underfunded and cannot pay out a lump sum. As a result, the estate must remain open for an indeterminate amount of time to receive these payments. I'm wondering if the executor can assign the benefit -- or if there isn't some way to get around keeping the estate open. Is the plan administrator just being stubborn, or is there really no other option?

[SoCalActuary]

Many estates include among their assets some form of continuing annuity.

Get it appraised. Make sure proper title is determined. File the estate return.

Let the annuity continue to get paid as it was intended.

[Andy the Actuary]

Depending upon the size of the installment relative to the cost of keeping the estate open, you may wish seek legal advice if the estate can be closed when it has a receivable. If the installment is sizable, then SCA offered the solution. You also indicated indeterminate amount of time but are we really talking about a maximum number of installments with the possibly of commuting these if the Plan becomes positioned to distribute benefits in a lump sum? What is this number?

The Plan administrator must follow the Plan. If the funded status prohibits payment, then so be it.