The issuance of an opinion letter for
a pre-approved plan by the Employee Plans function of the Tax
Exempt and Government Entities Division approves a plan as to form.
Typically, once a plan is submitted for an opinion letter the
entity that submits the plan (the “provider”) will begin marketing
the plan for its adoption by various employers. The issuance of the
opinion letter allows the provider to make retroactive changes to
the form of the plan to conform to recent changes in statutory
requirements. Form 4461, Form 4461-A, and Form 4461-B are used by
providers to apply for approval of their employee benefit plans
under section 401(a). Revenue procedure 2017-41 sets forth the
procedures of the Internal Revenue Service for issuing Opinion
Letters regarding the qualification in form of Pre-approved Plans
under §§ 401, 403 (a), and 4975 (e) (7) of the Internal Revenue
Code (Code). In addition, this revenue procedure modifies the IRS
pre-approved letter program by combining the master and prototype
(M&P) and volume submitter (VS) programs into a new Opinion
Letter program. The M&P and VS Programs are combined and
replaced by a single Opinion Letter program involving two types of
plans: Standardized Plans and Nonstandardized Plans.
US Code:
26
USC 403(b) Name of Law: Tax Sheltered Annuity Plans
US Code: 26
USC 401 Name of Law: Qualified pension, profit-sharing, and
stock bonus plans.
On behalf of this Federal agency, I certify that
the collection of information encompassed by this request complies
with 5 CFR 1320.9 and the related provisions of 5 CFR
1320.8(b)(3).
The following is a summary of the topics, regarding
the proposed collection of information, that the certification
covers:
(i) Why the information is being collected;
(ii) Use of information;
(iii) Burden estimate;
(iv) Nature of response (voluntary, required for a
benefit, or mandatory);
(v) Nature and extent of confidentiality; and
(vi) Need to display currently valid OMB control
number;
If you are unable to certify compliance with any of
these provisions, identify the item by leaving the box unchecked
and explain the reason in the Supporting Statement.