Audio Conferences

  June 28, 2006 at 02:00PM ET

Can freezing your defined benefit plans save your company money? IBM thinks so; IBM believes freezing their plan will save them up to $3 billion in the next 5 years. Other Fortune 500 companies – like Verizon, Tribune Corp., Lexmark, and Motorola – have recently either frozen their pension plans or are about to do so too.

The reasons? Market declines have seriously eroded the value of pension assets, while declining interest rates are creating major liabilities for future benefits to retirees.

Many healthy companies have run the numbers and decided to make the shift away from defined benefit (DB) pension plans to a stronger reliance on 401(k)s.

As interest rates have declined, sponsoring defined benefit pension plans has become increasingly expensive. Pension plan sponsors are suddenly facing rapidly growing contribution requirements; some companies have seen required contributions double or triple in recent years.

If the ongoing cost of your company’s DB plan is cause for concern, join IOMA and a panel of pension experts for this important discussion on the critical business issues involved in freezing part or all part of a defined benefit pension plan.

In just 90 minutes, you’ll get the cold-hard facts about freezing benefits plans. Plus, we’ll discuss:

• Reasons to freeze: the current landscape for retirement programs and the drivers motivating many companies to make a change
• Figuring and comparing financials of shifting away from employer-funded plans and moving toward employee-funded defined-contribution plans
• How such actions are likely to impact existing employees
• Options for underfunded plans
• Investigating appropriate exit strategies
• FASB and PBGC funding and accounting rule changes under consideration that might force companies towards a plan freeze
• Reducing/controlling the volatility and unpredictability of required plan payments

Featured Faculty

Bob Aglira
Worldwide Partner, Mercer Human Resource Consulting

Scott Jarboe
Mercer Human Resource Consulting