Suspension of Benefits question

Company A sponsors Plan A; Company B sponsors Plan B. After Company B buys Company A, Plan A is frozen and merged into Plan B. Company A employees begin accruing new benefits under Plan B.

I'm being told that the Suspension of Benefits Notice that Company B provided is only good for the new benefits and not for the old benefits, but I can't figure out why. (I'm getting this second hand and haven't seen any plan documents or the notice yet).

Any thoughts?

That makes no sense.  My thoughts would be to read the notice and the plans.  

13 hours ago, ERISAAPPLE said:

That makes no sense.  My thoughts would be to read the notice and the plans.  

That's my next step.

The only thing that occurred to me is that maybe the date for NRA in Plan A is 62 and for Plan B it's 65, so perhaps the notice arguably isn't good for the earlier benefit.

But, yes, waiting to get a hold of the plans and the notice.

Did company A have a suspension of benefits provision? If it did not, then you cannot add one to those benefits. An SoB can only be added to prospective participants/benefits.

On 2/22/2018 at 2:23 PM, CuseFan said:

Did company A have a suspension of benefits provision? If it did not, then you cannot add one to those benefits. An SoB can only be added to prospective participants/benefits.

Thanks. I'll check. Do you have any legal authority for this?

From the DB Answer Book - cites are the Heinz case, Rev Proc 2005-23, and 1.411(d)-3(a)(3).

Defined Benefit Answer Book - Donovan, Young, and Alsguth,Q 30:55,May an employer change the types of employment covered by a suspension of benefits provision after an employee has already returned to work?

Last Updated: 12/2017

No. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Central Laborers' Pension Fund v. Heinz [124 S. Ct. 2230 (2004)] that an amendment to the plan's suspension of benefit rules that applied to a retiree's benefits earned before the amendment's adoption was subject to the anti-cutback limitations of Code Section 411(d)(6). In response to this ruling, the IRS issued Revenue Procedure 2005-23 (and extended the date required to comply in Revenue Procedure 2005-76) to limit the effect of the Supreme Court ruling to a prospective basis. This revenue procedure contains guidelines for those companies who had plans with provisions in conflict with the Heinz decision to correct their defects. [ Rev. Proc. 2005-23, 2005-18 I.R.B. 991] This has also been added to the regulations in proposed form by Proposed Treasury Regulations Section 1.411(d)-3(a)(3).

Are talking about a 204(h) notice or a suspension of benefits notice?  Because you said the plan was frozen, I thought you meant 204(h) notice, even though you said suspension of benefits notice.  Now it sounds like you truly did mean a suspension of benefits notice.