The Department of Finance announced the release of proposed amendments to the Income Tax Regulations (Canada) that would assist registered pension plan (RPP) administrators and sponsors to manage and maintain their benefit obligations through the COVID-19 pandemic.

The temporary relief measures that apply to RPPs are as follows:

• Extend the deadline to retroactively credit pensionable service: Pursuant to subsection 8308(4) of the Regulations, a member of a defined benefit provision of a pension plan may be permitted the option to elect to have an eligible period of reduced service credited as pensionable service under the plan, provided the election occurs by April 30 of the year following the year in which the eligible period of reduced service ends. Similar rules apply under subsection 8308(5), for eligible periods of reduced service under money purchase (MP)/defined contribution (DC) provisions. When any of these Regulations apply, plan members can have the period recognized on a current service basis, so that employers can report the period by way of a pension adjustment rather than a past-service pension adjustment. Section 8308 of the Regulations is proposed to be amended to extend the April 30, 2020 deadline to June 1, 2020, or a later date acceptable to the Minister of National Revenue, for eligible periods of reduced service that ended in 2019.

• Permit retroactive contributions in respect of 2020: Section 8308 of the Regulations is proposed to be amended by adding new subsections (5.1), (5.2) and (5.3) to permit a retroactive contribution to be made to an employee’s MP/DC account, in respect of the year 2020, whether or not the employee had reduced employment service or reduced pay, subject to three conditions:

• a retroactive contribution is made by the employee (or the employee makes a written commitment to make the contribution) after 2020 and before May 2021;

• in the case of a contribution payable by a participating employer, the contribution is made after 2020 and before May 2021 (or, for a matching contribution made at any later date, the contribution is conditional on the contribution that the employee committed to make); and

• the contribution must replace, in whole or in part, a contribution that would have been required for the 2020 year but for an amendment made to the plan that reduced required contributions.

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