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Compliance March 15, 2008
IRS Details Simplified Determination Letter Application Process
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has issued Announcement 2008-23, which lays out a new simplified process for obtaining determination letters for pre-approved defined contribution plans.
Reported by Fred Schneyer
According to the announcement, the IRS expects to issue on March 31, 2008, or shortly after that, opinion and advisory letters for pre-approved (i.e. master and prototype and volume submitter) defined contribution plans that were timely filed to comply with the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act (EGTRRA) and other plan qualification requirement changes (See IRS Issues 2007 Cumulative List of Changes for Plan Qualification).
The tax agency said employers using these pre-approved plan documents to restate a plan for EGTRRA will be required to adopt the EGTRRA-approved plan document by April 30, 2010, and that the IRS will accept applications for individual determination letters submitted by adopters of these pre-approved plans starting on May 1, 2008.
In general, an application for an individual determination letter on a pre-approved plan is to be filed on Form 5307, Application for Determination for Adopters of Master or Prototype or Volume Submitter Plans, the agency said. These applications will be reviewed on the basis of the Cumulative List of Changes in Plan Qualification Requirements that was used to review the underlying pre-approved plan.
The IRS announcement is here. Additional IRS information about the process is available here.