EPCRS Workshop: Preventing and Correcting Qualified Plan Problems
Why Attend?
On August 14th, 2008, the IRS released new guidance on its correction program, the Employee Plans Compliance Resolution System (EPCRS). As maintaining and administering qualified plans continues to be ever more complex, you need to be able to identify, prevent, and correct plan errors. This live video webcast, featuring Joyce Kahn, who directly oversees the program, as well as two experienced employee benefits practitioners, will discuss those changes as well as challenges and questions you might be faced with during the corrections process.
Be amongst the first to understand what has changed and what hasn’t; and what the IRS will and will not accept for various corrections!
What You Will Learn
You need to be able to negotiate timely, efficient, and cost-effective corrections and monetary sanctions for qualified plan defects on behalf of your company or clients. To do so, you need to know:
What changes are addressed in Rev. Proc. 2008-50
Whether you can really use the Voluntary Correction Program to extend your remedial amendment period for good-faith amendments
What actually happens when faced with an Audit CAP--how does the IRS determine your minimum sanction and what can you do to reduce the amount assessed
How to fix a 401(k) Safe Harbor Failure
This 3 hour program will address these issues, as well as other topics, such as:
Correcting loan and distribution failures
Defined benefit plan issues
Correcting 401(k) failures for both traditional and safe harbor plans
Voluntary Correction Program (VCP) vs. Self-Correction Program (SCP)
Submission "dos" and "don'ts"
Case studies and practice tips will also be featured in each segment, and as time permits, the faculty will answer registrants’ questions submitted during the program. Advance questions may be emailed to Amy Weinberg at aweinberg@ali-aba.org.
Who should attend?
This program is designed at an intermediate-to-advanced level, and will particularly benefit third-party administrators, benefits counsel and consultants, plan administrators, accountants, and actuaries.
Planning Chair
Pamela D. Perdue, Summers, Compton, Wells & Hamburg, P.C., St. Louis
Faculty
Joyce I. Kahn, Manager, Employee Plans Voluntary Compliance, Tax Exempt and Government Entities, Internal Revenue Service, Washington, D.C.
Thomas G. Schendt, Alston & Bird LLP, Washington, D.C.
Program Schedule
(all times Eastern Daylight)
12:00 noon Introductory Remarks and Overview of EPCRS
12:15 p.m. Changes to EPCRS Reflected in New Guidance
12:25 p.m. Voluntary Correction Program
• Non-amender issues
• Correcting 401(k) failures and safe harbor 401(k) failures
• Correcting loan failures
• Correcting distribution failures
• Defined Benefit Plan Special Issues
1:30 p.m. Break
1:45 p.m. Correcting 415 Errors in a Defined Contribution Plan
The Earnings “Conundrum”
Submission and Procedural Issues
• Do’s and Don’ts
• How to short circuit strictly amendment failures
• Other errors not submitted that may be discovered
Self-Correction Program
Audit CAP (Closing Agreement Program)
• Determining sanctions when failures discovered on audit
• Determining sanctions when document failure discovered on
determination letter submission
2:45 p.m. Questions and Answers
3:15 p.m. Adjournment
Total 60-minute hours of instruction: 3.0 Total 50-minute hours: 3.5
Suggested Prerequisite: Limited experience in legal practice in subject matter or completion of Basic CLE Course in subject matter
Educational Objective: Acquisition of knowledge and skills to develop proficiency as a practitioner; maintenance of professional competence as a practitioner; provision of information on recent legal developments
Level of Instruction: Intermediate to Advanced
Times
Eastern 12 noon - 3:15 pm
Central 11 am - 2:15 pm
Mountain 10 am - 1:15 pm
Pacific & Arizona 9 am - 12:15 pm
Alaska 8 am - 11:15 am
Hawaii 6 am - 9:15 am
