New Year Brings New, (Sometimes) Lower VCP User Fees

Effective January 2, 2018, the IRS has materially lowered the user fees required to be paid in order to participate in the Voluntary Compliance Program (VCP) under the Employee Plans Compliance Resolution System or EPCRS.  VCP is a way for sponsors of qualified retirement plans to get IRS approval of voluntary correction of operational errors and other plan errors that jeopardize the plan’s tax-qualified status.  Under old user fees, which were based on the number of plan participants as of the last day of a plan year, most applicants fell within the 100 – 1,000 participant range, which in 2017 carried a fee of $5,000.  The new fees, set forth in Appendix A to IRS Revenue Procedure 2018-1, are based on plan assets as of the last day of the plan year and are as follows:

User Fee               Plan Assets

$1,500                   $500,000 or less

$3,000                   Over $500,000 to $10,000,000

$3,500                   Over $10,000,000

As many if not most plan sponsors will fall in the over $500,000 to $10,000,000 range, this will result in a $2,000 reduction in the applicable user fee.

Lowering the price barrier to participation in VCP is a positive for plan sponsors.  Obtaining a compliance statement from IRS through the program is the equivalent of insurance against penalties and interest that would be assessed if the plan problems were discovered on audit.  The VCP compliance statement is also crucial in the event the plan sponsor sells its business or merges with another entity, as plan problems must be disclosed in the pre-deal due diligence stage, and unresolved plan problems can slow down or even derail a sale or merger transaction.  Speaking of insurance, some fiduciary liability insurance carriers will cover, and provide reimbursement for, the VCP user fee and professional services used in preparing the application (although generally amounts that are owed to the plan are not covered).

There is a downside to this new fee schedule, namely in the loss of reduced fees (as low as $300) for submissions that were limited to participant loan errors, failures to make required minimum distributions, and SEP and SIMPLE plan submissions.