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Repeal of cross tested plans?


Guest John McLeod

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Guest John McLeod
Posted

According to a recent ASPA seminar that I attended, cross tested plans are supposed to be going away in the next 18 months. Is this timetable still valid for cross tested plans?

Posted

THe treasury is supposed to have sent proposed regs to the Federal Register, effective in 2002, concerning cross-testing. What they are no one knows. I bet they just get more complicated.

Posted

No, they are not going away. The rules are being tightened.

Targets are cross tested plans. So are age weighed ps plans. They are not likely to change much.

DB's are similar to cross tested plans mathematically. They are unaffected.

It's the aggressive new designs that may go away or be changed.

Posted

and that in will be coming soon...

some type of 'safe-harbor'.

it will be interesting to see what it is (or they are)

an off the wall guess might be a 5% 'minimum'. maybe full vesting.

Posted

I understand that there will be "gateways" which will, in effect put a cap on the overall disparity. Probably something along the lines of--highest HCE overall allocation rate (including er discretionary, match and deferrals) cannot be more than 3x (4x? 5x?) the lowest NHCE overall allocation rate. I believe that there will be a "break" to the employer if it uses a 401(k) safe harbor--in this case the deferrals of the HCEs are disregarded in calculating the allocation rates. The regs are supposed to be coming out any day now!!! Boy--can't wait!

LKP

Posted

The IRS issued proposed regulations yesterday on this topic. I'd guess that the Benefits Buzz will have a link to them by the day's end.

Posted

Andy -

my guess was based on rolling dice 100 times and dividing by 100, then using a set forward of...just kidding.

my guess of 5% minimum was actually based on the fact if you had top heavy plans (DB and DC) the minimum is 5% in the DC. since you are testing the DC plan as a 'DB' plan (so to speak) it seemed like IRS logic to use 5%. That probably had nothing at all to do with it, but it sounds good! Overall, because you use the lesser of 5% or 1/3 the allocation to the HCE I don't believe it will effect most of the cross tested plans we run. for 2001 and the probable 35,000 annual addition limit - now that might have a bigger impact.

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