The Treasury Department and the IRS have issued proposed regulations that would permit employers to make changes to their retirement plan distribution options while protecting the rights of plan participants pursuant to secton 411(d)(6) of the Internal Revenue Code and section 204(g) of ERISA. You can access the press release here which provides as follows:
The regulations are based on suggestions received in response to a solicitation of comments published by the IRS in 2002 and 2003. Under the proposed regulations, an employer could eliminate an optional form of benefit if the plan retains a similar form with the same value or if the plan permits participants to select among a specified group of core options that have the same value as the eliminated form. The regulations would allow plan sponsors with many different payment options to simplify the number available; however, they generally do not permit elimination of a lump sum payment option.
More on this later . . .