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CCH® PENSION AND BENEFITS — 9/16/08

PPA technical corrections bill reportedly stalls in Congress

A package of technical corrections to the Pension Protection Act of 2006 (PPA; P.L. 109-280) is unlikely to be passed by the Congress before the November elections, according to a staff member of the Senate Finance Committee. Despite the need for PPA technical corrections, the legislation has languished because of partisan squabbles, the staff member said, speaking on September 6, 2008 at an American Law Institute-American Bar Association (ALI-ABA) retirement benefits conference in Washington, D.C.

Like all pieces of major legislation, the PPA requires various technical corrections to implement Congress’s intent. The House and Senate have passed different versions of a PPA technical corrections package (H.R. 3361, CCH Pension Plan Guide ¶29,149, and S. 1974). The House version would, among other things, revise the rules for amendments of a plan while a waiver of minimum funding standards is in effect, amend provisions that allow the Secretary of Treasury to provide a transition rule for estimating an at-risk plan’s funding target attainment percentage and exclude from the definition of prohibited payment for purposes of limitations on accelerated benefit distributions a payment that may be immediately distributed without the consent of the participant.

“PPA technical corrections are hamstrung by politics,” the staff member said. One stumbling block appears to be a provision relating to Indian tribal government pension plans, the staffer noted. The PPA technical corrections package will likely not pass Congress before November, the staff member said. The staff member said that it is “unclear” at this point whether Congress would return for a lame-duck session after the November elections.

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