§1415 Transfers pursuant to change in bargaining representative

Summary

When an employer leaves one multiemployer pension plan because a certified change in the workers’ bargaining representative happens after September 25, 1980, and those workers will join another multiemployer plan, the old plan must move some of the benefits, assets, and related obligations to the new plan. The employer must tell the old plan sponsor within 30 days after it knows the change will happen. The old plan sponsor must tell the employer how much withdrawal liability the employer owes, that it plans to move the workers’ nonforfeitable benefits, and how much will be moved. The old plan sponsor must also tell the new plan what will transfer. The new plan has 60 days to ask the corporation to stop the transfer. The corporation can block the move if it finds the new plan would suffer substantial financial harm. If the employer does not object within 60 days, or the new plan does not successfully stop the transfer within set time frames (including a 180-day limit on appeals), the transfer goes ahead. The employer’s withdrawal liability to the old plan is lowered by the amount that the value of the promised but unfunded benefits moved exceeds the assets moved. The old plan must not transfer assets if it is in reorganization or the transfer would force it into reorganization. If a transfer is blocked for that reason, the old plan must still move nonforfeitable benefits either up to the employer’s withdrawal liability or equal to it, depending on their value. Plan sponsors can instead agree to move assets under other rules, but the employer’s liability is still lowered as if this section applied. If the employer leaves the new plan within 240 months after the transfer, the new-plan liability is the larger of the normal new-plan figure or the old-plan reduction (reduced by 5 percent for each 12-month period after the transfer). Definitions: “appropriate amount of assets” = amount by which the value of benefits to be moved exceeds the employer’s withdrawal liability; “certified change of collective bargaining representative” = a change certified under the Labor‑Management Relations Act or the Railway Labor Act.