The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has announced a phone forum to discuss the regulations released on October 18 (see IRS Issues Rules on Hybrid Retirement Plans).Michael Spaid, IRS Actuary with Employee Plans Rulings and Agreements will discuss the regulations, and Linda Marshall, Senior Counsel with the Office of Chief Counsel has been invited to participate as well, according to the announcement.
The phone forum is scheduled for November 23 at 2 p.m. ET.You need to register to attend prior to the event.
The IRS notes that if you have a specific matter that you would like the speakers to address, you can let them know via e-mail at ep.phoneforum@irs.gov, on or before November 19, 2010.
The FY 2011 EP Work Plan includes
seven operating priorities which, according to the document, address
EP’s mission in FY 2011 of protecting retirement plan assets and the
benefits of plan participants.
Among the seven EP operating priorities for FY 2011 are:
Analyze the responses to the
401(k) Questionnaire and “use the results to develop compliance
strategies and projects to address issues identified in 401(k) plans”
(see IMHO: Compliance “Deportment”).The
IRS notes that an interim report will be prepared by the third quarter
of FY 2011 (June), with a final report to be published and posted to the
Retirement Plans Community web page (www.irs.gov/ep) “during the early part of FY 2012 to share the findings with external stakeholders”.The
Work Plan goes on to note that the results will be “utilized to
redesign and improve case selection strategies and develop follow-on
compliance projects to address identified issues and trends”. It also
noted that potential areas of concern would be addressed through
education and outreach enhancements, determinations, guidance, voluntary
compliance and “enforcement activities.”
403(b) Focus
For 403(b) plan sponsors, the report
speaks to a focus on developing strategies and procedures to enhance the
403(b) compliance initiative “through guidance, education and outreach,
voluntary compliance, and enforcement activities.”It
goes on to note that this will be accomplished by “opening the 403(b)
pre-approved program and designing the 403(b) approval letter program
for individually designed plans, partnering with external stakeholders,
developing a 403(b) fix-it guide, and publishing reports on 403(b) EPCU
project initiatives”.
As
for smaller employers, the IRS said it plans to enhance outreach
strategies to “address key small business issues impacting the Employee
Plans sector”.Strategies outlined for doing so include
utilizing Customer Education and Outreach products to encourage the
small business community to sponsor and maintain retirement plans,
provide plain language tools to encourage them to conduct self audits,
and help them to use EPCRS corrections programs and applicable guidance.Finally,
to “listen to the needs of the community to improve product placement
and optimize modernization of tailored products.”
(Cont...)
Also on the list:
Address
key international issues impacting the Employee Plans sector to improve
compliance with the international tax provisions through appropriate
use of IRS-wide, TE/GE-wide and customer-tailored strategies, while also
continuing to collaborate with its Large Business and International
(LB&I) division and other functions to “educate employees, identify
complex international transactions, and recognize target areas of
significant risk and potential abuse impacting retirement plans,” among
other items.
Continuing
to partner with Federal, State & Local Governments (FSLG) and
Indian Tribal Governments (ITG), improve service to the governmental
plan community through the continued development of a handbook for
governmental plan sponsors detailing the technical requirements
applicable to such plans, educating the governmental plan community
about the opportunity to request a determination letter during Cycle E
(ending January 31, 2011), providing guidance and frequently asked
questions to governmental plan sponsors addressing issues that have
arisen during that process, as needed, and the continued gathering of
information concerning governmental plans through various sources and
sharing of that data with the governmental plan community.
Detect,
deter and address emerging/abusive transactions by using promoter
investigations to support the TE/GE corporate strategy to deter the
marketing of abusive promoter schemes to the retirement plan community
by considering civil or criminal fraud or seeking DOJ injunctions where
applicable, developing proactive strategies for identifying and
addressing emerging issues, working with the Compliance Issue Counsel to
increase cross-functional efforts to evaluate emerging compliance
issues, sharing with the general public new potentially abusive schemes
and emerging issues of interest/concern to the IRS as they are
identified through an improved and dedicated Internet page; and engaging
in ongoing assessment of the effectiveness of the strategy.
Improve
the staggered determination process by continuing to analyze previous
application submissions, Form 5500 filing data and the ACT Report
recommendations to implement changes that will substantially increase
customer satisfaction by decreasing cycle time, and improved processing
efficiencies to reduce the impact of submission spikes.
(Cont...)
In
releasing the document, the IRS notes that the “integral focus” of the
EP Work Plan is to foster and promote plan sponsors compliance with the
applicable Internal Revenue Code provisions. The IRS notes that,
overall, the EP Work Plan supports the IRS’s Strategic Plan which
outlines two goals that guide the direction of the IRS:
Improve service to make voluntary compliance easier
Enforce the law to ensure everyone meets their obligation to pay taxes
It
closes by noting that “EP will further support these goals by
“investing in two strategic foundations: our people and our technology”.