Safe Harbors For Rollover Contributions

Plan administrators of qualified plans are always concerned that amounts they receive as rollovers actually are eligible for rollover treatment, since accepting non-rollover funds will violate the terms of the plan. Administrators are in a quandary because they want to accommodate plan participants, but don't want to jeopardize their plan's qualified status. A recent Revenue Ruling helps by giving examples of the kind of evidence administrators can rely upon to determine that a rollover request is valid.

Takeaways from the ruling:

•  In the absence of information to the contrary, it is reasonable for an administrator to determine that the sending plan is qualified if the administrator goes online to the DOL's 5500 website and determines that the sending plan reported on its 5500 that it was intended to be qualified;