The Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS) Employee Plans Compliance Resolution System (EPCRS) allows employers to correct errors involving the maintenance and operation of tax-qualified retirement plans. The correction programs and options that make up EPCRS have, until now, been established exclusively in a series of IRS notices and revenue procedures dating back more than 30 years. However, as part of the SECURE 2.0 Act, Congress took it upon itself to radically expand EPCRS to allow employers to self-correct most inadvertent failures to comply with the tax-qualification rules under the Internal Revenue Code.
This Special Report discusses the history behind the creation of EPCRS, outlines some of its key features, and highlights how the growth and expansion of this program continues to improve IRS enforcement of tax-qualified plan rules by encouraging plan sponsors to establish practices and procedures designed to ensure compliance, thereby avoiding the harsh tax penalties of plan disqualification.
The SECURE 2.0 Act requires participants who earned more than $145,000 in FICA wages in the prior year from their current employer to make all catch-up contributions on a Roth basis beginning in 2024. For many employers, the primary concern is how to integrate the new rule with how payroll deductions for catch-up contributions are processed and then transmitted to plan recordkeepers.
Retirement plans often apply (and in some cases are required to use) multiple definitions of wages or compensation for various plan purposes. Given this complexity, failures to follow a plan’s definition of compensation are one of the most common issues experienced by retirement plan sponsors. Unfortunately, as drafted, the SECURE 2.0 Act only adds to that complexity.
Beginning after December 31, 2023, the SECURE 2.0 Act indicates that any plan that permits catch-up contributions must require certain employees to make their catch-up contributions on a Roth basis. Employers have expressed significant concerns regarding their ability to implement the necessary system changes—specifically to payroll and recordkeeping systems—by year-end.
In response, employers have begun to explore alternatives that might simplify implementation (or avoid the need to do it altogether). This has produced several questions about what employers can and cannot do.
Beginning after December 31, 2023, the SECURE 2.0 Act indicates that any plan that permits catch-up contributions must require certain employees—i.e., those whose wages from their employer exceed $145,000 in the prior calendar year—to make their catch-up contributions on a Roth basis. This change raises a host of questions about how the rule is intended to apply in practice and even more concerns about the operational obstacles employers will face in attempting to implement the change by year-end.
In this series of articles, we will explore the implications of SECURE 2.0’s changes to catch-up contributions and how employers should respond.
The US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) are extending telehealth flexibilities that allow providers to prescribe controlled substances. While the extension is in place, the DEA indicated that it will be further evaluating its recently proposed rules for post-COVID-19 public health emergency telemedicine prescription of controlled substances.
US lawmakers recently advanced a broad healthcare bill during a US House Energy & Commerce Health Subcommittee markup. In this Health Policy Breakroom podcast episode, McDermott+Consulting’s Debra Curtis and Rodney Whitlock break down the markup and address extenders, PBMs, site-neutral policies and the timing of this bill.
At a recent open Commission meeting, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) voted unanimously to issue a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to amend the Health Breach Notification Rule (HBNR). The FTC’s proposed amendment aims to codify the HBNR’s application to digital health and mobile technologies. However, several aspects of the proposed amendment lack clarity and are likely to cause confusion unless further clarified through the ongoing rulemaking process.
A new bill introduced in Congress would allow 403(b) plans maintained by tax-exempt organizations to make use of collective investment trust (CIT) investments. CITs are an alternative to mutual funds that may provide significant cost savings for 403(b) plans and their participants. The SECURE 2.0 Act took the first steps along this path by making amendments to the Internal Revenue Code to permit 403(b) plans to invest in these vehicles; however, that legislation failed to include the necessary changes to securities laws. The Retirement Fairness for Charities and Educational Institutions Act of 2023 aims to take the next steps by amending the Securities Act and the Investment Company Act to allow 403(b) plans to make use of CITs.
The US Department of Health and Human Services Office of the Inspector General (HHS OIG) recently unveiled a new toolkit that seeks to help analyze telehealth claims for federal healthcare program integrity risks. It is based on methodologies highlighted in OIG’s September 2022 data brief; the data brief identified billing practices by Medicare providers that OIG was concerned posed a high risk to program integrity. OIG intends for the toolkit to be used by public and private parties—including Medicare Advantage plan sponsors, private health plans, State Medicaid Fraud Control Units and other federal healthcare agencies—to assess program integrity risks and identify providers whose billing may warrant further scrutiny.
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