SECTION 16. ESTABLISHMENT OF

SIX-YEAR AMENDMENT/APPROVAL CYCLE FOR PRE-APPROVED PLANS

.01 This Part IV sets forth rules and procedures for the six-year remedial amendment/approval cycles for pre-approved plans.

.02 Sponsors and practitioners maintaining non-mass submitter plans generally have until January 31st of the calendar year following the opening of the six-year remedial amendment cycle to submit applications for opinion and advisory letters. In addition, the deadline for word-for-word identical adopters and

minor modifier placeholder applications is January 31st of the calendar year following the opening of the six-year remedial amendment cycle (see section 12 of Rev. Proc. 2005–16 for more details). Sponsors and practitioners maintaining mass submitter plans and national sponsors generally have until October 31st of the calendar year in which the six-year remedial amendment cycle opens to submit opinion and advisory letter applications. ² In addition, sponsors and practitioners maintaining mass submitter plans are encouraged to submit their word-for-word and minor modifier placeholder applications by the earlier mass submitter submission deadline, October 31st. The Service will evaluate this new provision (that is, a different deadline for applications of mass submitter plans versus word-for-word and minor modifier placeholder applications) and may, at its discretion and through applicable published guidance, change the deadline date for the word-for-word and minor modifier placeholder applications in future six-year remedial amendment cycles.

.03 When the review of a cycle for pre-approved plans has neared completion (after approximately a two-year review process), the Service will publish an announcement providing the date by which adopting employers must adopt the newly approved plans. This will be a uniform date that will apply to all adopting employers. Depending upon the length of the review process, it is expected that this date will give virtually all employers approximately a two-year window to adopt their updated plans. For purposes of this revenue procedure, an adopting employer means an employer who satisfies the requirements described under section 17 of this revenue procedure.

.04 An adopting employer that adopts the approved M&P or VS plan by the announced deadline will have adopted the plan within the employer’s six-year remedial amendment cycle. The announced deadline will be the end of the plan’s remedial amendment cycle with respect to all disqualifying provisions for which the remedial amendment period would otherwise end during the cycle.

2 With respect to the initial EGTRRA application, section 18.02 provides a later deadline of January 31, 2006 for defined contribution M&P and VS plans and January 31, 2008 for defined benefit M&P and VS plans to be submitted by national sponsors and sponsors and practitioners maintaining mass submitter plans.

July 9, 2007 67 2007–28 I.R.B.

five-year remedial amendment cycle applicable to the employer, and

(3) the employer adopts either an existing pre-approved plan or an interim pre-approved plan before the end of the employer’s five-year remedial amendment cycle as determined under Part III of this revenue procedure,

An employer may only adopt an interim or an existing pre-approved plan that is not the newly approved version of the plan if the employer adopts such plan before the beginning of the adoption period described in section 16.03 and 16.04 during the applicable six-year cycle. Such an employer must re-adopt either the newly approved version of the same plan or a newly approved version of a different pre-approved plan during the adoption period. Any employer whose five-year cycle has not ended may adopt a plan during or after the adoption period, but such employer must adopt the newly approved version of a pre-approved plan.

.04 An employer is an intended adopter if:

(1) the employer currently maintains a qualified individually designed plan and

(2) such employer and a sponsor or practitioner who maintains an existing pre-approved plan or an interim pre-approved plan execute Form 8905, Certifi- cation of Intent To Adopt a Pre-approved Plan ⁴, before the end of the employer’s five-year remedial amendment cycle as determined under Part III of this revenue procedure. ⁵ However, if the employer’s five-year remedial amendment cycle ends during or after the announced adoption period described in section 16.03 and 16.04 associated with the applicable six-year cycle, rather than execute Form 8905, the employer should instead adopt the newly approved version of a pre-approved plan (and will be treated as a new adopter under section 17.03).

.05 Replacement Plan (1) An employer is an adopter of a replacement plan (defined in section 17.05(1)) under the following situations: (a) The employer timely adopted a preapproved plan that is to be replaced by a “replacement” plan (that is, the plan docu

.05 If necessary, the Service may revise the schedule described in this section to respond to changing circumstances and needs of plan sponsors.