Time Period for Making Salary Reduction Contributions to a SIMPLE

[TD]

IRS Publication 560, p. 15-16 says an employer must make salary reduction contributions to a SIMPLE IRA within 30 days after the end of the month in which the amounts would have otherwise been payable to the employee.  Then it says "Certain plans subject to DOL rules may have an earlier due date for salary reduction contributions." What are these "certain" plans? Is this referring to the DOL safe harbor rule that provides the employee contributions deposited to retirement plans with fewer than 100 participants must be deposited within 7 business days following receipt or withholding by employers? When would the latter not apply since SIMPLE plans apply to businesses with 100 or less employees? 

[Tom Veal]

The IRS is referring to ERISA-covered plans (i. e., practically all SIMPLE IRA plans), for which the general rule is that elective deferrals must be remitted to the plan (to participants' IRA's in this case) as soon as they can be segregated from the employer's general assets.  That will almost always be much sooner than 30 days after the end of the month of the contribution.  Small plans have, as you note, a safe harbor exception to the general rule.