Pension Protection Act Blog

The IRS issued Notice 2007-69 today. It resolves some of the issues involving the changes to normal retirement age raised by the Final Regulations on Distributions from a Pension Plan Upon Attainment of Normal Retirement Age, which the IRS released on May 22, 2007. (hat tip to BenefitsLink.com.)

This Notice addresses 3 main issues raised by those final regulations, which are to:

• provide temporary relief, until the first day of the first plan year that begins after June 30, 2008, for certain pension plans under which the definition of normal retirement age may be required to be changed to comply with the regulations relating to a plan’s normal retirement age that were recently issued under § 401(a) of the InternalRevenue Code;
• identify potential violations of the vesting and accrued benefit requirements for defined benefit plans under § 411 that may arise from
  a definition of normal retirement age based on a minimum period of service; and
• request comments from sponsors of governmental plans as defined in §414(d)) and other plans not subject to the requirements of § 411 on whether such a plan may define normal retirement age based on years of service.

Notice 2007-69 also contains a reminder that the final regulations issued on May 22, 2007 are included on the 2006 Cumulative List, so individually designed plans and multiple employer plans which restate and submit for a determination letter during Cycle B are required to comply with these regulations, and the guidance provided by this notice.

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