INTERMEDIATE
ACCOUNTING
Chapter 19
Accounting for Postretirement Benefits
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
What Types of Pensions Plans Are There?
(Slide 1 of 3)

There are two types of pension plans that employers tend to
provide their employees:


A defined benefit plan is a type of plan in which the future
employee benefit is defined by a formula and the amount that
the company contributes into the plan depends on the future
needs of the plan.
A defined contribution plan is a type of plan in which the
employer’s contribution into the pension fund is based on a
formula, so that the future benefits are limited to an amount that
can be provided by:


The contributions made during the employee’s service to the company.
The return earned on the investment of those contributions.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
What Types of Pensions Plans Are There?
(Slide 2 of 3)

In addition, companies’ pension plans can be:



A noncontributory plan where the entire pension cost is born by
the employer (company)
A contributory plan where employees bear part of the cost of
the plan and make contributions from their salaries into the
pension fund
With respect to Internal Revenue Code (IRC) rules and
regulations, pension plans may be either:


A qualified pension plan is a type of pension plan that covers
the majority of the company’s employees and limits contributions
to certain amounts.
A nonqualified pension plan is a type of pension plan that is
not governed by the IRC rules and regulations.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
What Types of Pensions Plans Are There?
(Slide 3 of 3)

Estimates that the company must make for a defined benefit
pension plan include:





How many employees will remain with the company until retirement?
What will employees’ retirement benefits will be at the time?
What pension fund assets will be available to pay retirement
benefits?
What will be the length of time the employee will draw retirement
benefits?
Actuaries are certified professionals who are trained to
determine future risk, estimate probabilities of future events,
make price decision, estimate present and future values, and
formulate investment strategies.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Pension Relationships: Employees, Company,
and Asset Management Company
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
How Do Companies Account for
Defined Benefit Plans?

In a defined benefit pension plan, employees are promised
future payments based on the formula in a pension plan
contract.

For example, a company may have a retirement plan under
which an employee who retires at age 65 would receive annual
retirement income according to the following formula:
Average of Last 5 Years’ Salary × Number of Years of Service × 0.025

An individual who worked 30 years for the company and had an
average salary during the last 5 years of $128,000 would
receive annual pension benefit payments of $96,000 per year,
calculated as follows:
$128,000 × 30 × 0.025 = $96,000
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
What Are the Components of Pension Expense?

GAAP uses the term net periodic pension cost when
discussing the cost of a pension plan that is recognized in an
employer’s financial statements during an accounting period.



This term is used as opposed to pension expense because a
company may capitalize some of its net periodic pension costs as
part of an asset.
For simplicity, we will use the term pension expense and assume
none of the pension costs are capitalized.
The service cost is the increase in the projected benefit
obligation due to employees providing service to the
company during the current period.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Calculation of Current Period Service Cost
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Interest Cost

The interest cost is the increase in the projected benefit
obligation due to the passage of time.

The interest cost is calculated as follows:
Projected Benefit Obligation
Interest Cost = at the Beginning of the Period × Discount Rate


The projected benefit obligation is the present value of the
future retirement payments earned by the employees to date
(based on their expected future compensation levels).
Interest on the projected obligation accrues because of
the passage of time and the interest cost is added to the
computation of pension expense.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Return on Plan Assets

There are two returns that affect pension expense:




The actual return on plan assets is the dividends and interest
earned and the unrealized and realized changes in the fair
market of the pension plan assets.
The expected return on plan assets is the expected increase
in the plan assets due to investing activities.
When calculating pension expense, GAAP specifies that
the actual return should be used.
GAAP requires that the expected return be shown as a
separate item when disclosing the amount of pension
expense recognized.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Amortization of Prior Service Cost




Often a company will amend its pension plan and this
results in an increase in the projected benefit obligation.
Retroactive benefits may also be granted at the initial
adoption of a plan.
The cost of these retroactive benefits is the prior service
cost.
Amortization of prior service cost assigns an equal amount
to each future service period of each active employee
who, at the date of the amendment, is expected to receive
future benefits under the plan.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Gain or Loss
(Slide 1 of 2)


The gain or loss arises because estimates and assumptions
are made about many of the items included in the
computation of pension costs and benefits.
Current accounting guidance provide three methods for
companies to recognize gains and losses in pension
expense:



Immediate recognition in pension expense
Minimum amortization using the corridor approach
Any systematic and rational approach that results in faster
amortization than the corridor approach
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Gain or Loss
(Slide 2 of 2)

Under the corridor approach, amortization of any net gain or
loss is included in the pension expense of a given year if the
beginning of the year cumulative net gain or loss exceeds a
“corridor.”


The corridor is defined as 10% of the greater of the beginning of
the year projected benefit obligation or the beginning of the year
fair value of the plan assets.
If amortization is required, the minimum amortization is
computed as follows:
Minimum Amortization =
Cumulative Net Gain or Loss Recorded
Corridor at the
in Accumulated Other Comprehensive ‒Beginning of the Year
Income
Average Remaining Service Period of the Active Employees
Expected to Receive Benefits under the Pension Plan
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Summary of the Components of
Pension Expense
Service Cost (Present Value of Benefits Earned During the Year Using the
Discount Rate)
+ Interest Cost (Projected Benefit Obligation at Beginning of the year ×
Discount Rate)
‒ Expected Return on Plan Assets (Fair Value of Plan Assets at the
Beginning of the Year × Expected LongTerm Rate of Return on Plan Assets)
+ Amortization of Prior Service Cost (Present Value of Additional Benefits
Granted at Adoption or Modification of
the Plan Amortized over the
Remaining Service Lives of Active
Employees)
± Gain or Loss (Immediate Recognition of Amortization of the Cumulative
Net Gain or Loss from Previous Periods Using the Corridor
Method or Other Reasonable Method)
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Pension Obligation
(Slide 1 of 2)



The settlement rate (or discount rate) is the rate at which the
pension benefits can be effectively settled.
The change in the projected benefit obligation is determined as
follows:
The accumulated benefit obligation is the present value of the
benefits attributed to employee service provided before a specified
date based on the current salary levels.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Pension Obligation
(Slide 2 of 2)
The vested benefit obligation is the actuarial present
value of the vested benefits, which are those benefits
that the employee have the right to receive if the
employee no longer works for the employer.
 The projected benefit obligation will provide the
largest and most conservative measure of the pension
obligation while the vested benefit will be the smallest
measure.

© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Pension Assets


The actuarial funding method is a method to determine the
amounts and timing of employer contributions that will be needed
over time to provide for current and future pension benefits.
The market-related value is either the fair market value at the
end of each accounting period or a calculated value that
recognizes changes in fair value in a systematic or rational
manner over not more than 5 years.
Beginning Fair Value of Pension Plan Assets
+ Actual Return on Plan Assets
+ Contributions (Amount Funded) by the Company
‒ Payments to Retirees
= Ending Fair Value of Pension Plan Assets
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Accrued/Prepaid Pension Cost
(Slide 1 of 3)


When a company recognizes pension expense, the between
pension expense and the amount contributed to the pension fund
is recorded in the Accrued/Prepaid Pension Cost account.
The difference between the projected benefit obligation and the
fair value of the pension plan assets at the end of the period is
the funded status of the pension plan.


If the projected benefit obligation is greater than the fair value of
the pension plan assets (the plan is underfunded), the
accrued/prepaid pension cost is reported as a liability.
If the projected benefit obligation is less than the fair value of the
pension plan assets (the plan is overfunded), the accrued/prepaid
pension cost is reported as an asset.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Accrued/Prepaid Pension Cost
(Slide 2 of 3)

The adjustment to Other Comprehensive Income can
be separated into two components:
 Retroactive
benefits (prior service cost) that have been
granted and are amortized into pension expense
 Gains or losses (which include the difference between
the actual and expected return on plan assets, as well
as any actuarial gains or losses)
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Accrued/Prepaid Pension Cost
(Slide 3 of 3)

A company may report the following pension plan asset,
pension plan liability, and accumulated other comprehensive
income items, depending on the circumstances, on its balance
sheet:
Assets
Prepaid pension cost (debit balance)
Liabilities
Accrued pension cost (credit balance)
Shareholders’ Equity
Accumulated other comprehensive
income:
Prior service cost and/or:
• loss not yet amortized to pension
expense (negative element)
• gain not yet amortized to pension
expense (positive element)
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Conceptual Issues: Prior Service Cost

Accounting regulators considered four alternative methods for
how the prior service cost should be initially considered:




Account for it prospectively.
Recognize the total amount as an expense in the period in which it
arises (i.e., the current period) and record a liability.
Recognize the liability and reduce other comprehensive income, and
then amortize the prior service coast as a component of pension
expense. In addition, the liability is reduced and other
comprehensive income is increased as the prior service amount is
amortized.
(GAAP)
Decrease retained earnings (as a retrospective adjustment because
they reflect prior service) and record a liability.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Conceptual Issues:
Presentation of Pension Plan Assets

There are two alternative views for accounting by the
employer for pension assets:




Funding is a discharge of the pension liability.
The pension liability is not discharged until the retiree receives the
pension payment.
(GAAP)
The second approach is required by GAAP, except that the
projected benefit obligation is netted against the pension plan
assets to determine the underfunding (liability) or overfunding
(asset).
If a company has multiple defined benefit pension plans, the
plans cannot be netted against each and must be reported
separately on the balance sheet.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Conceptual Issue: Pension Liabilities

In making the decision on what liability should be used in pension
accounting, regulators examined five alternatives to determine
which best met the recognition measure criteria of a liability:






Contribution based on an actuarial funding method
Amount attributed to employee service to date
Termination liability
Amount of vested benefits
Amount payable to retirees
Accounting regulators settled on the second alternative. The only
exception made is the projected benefit obligation is netted
against the pension plan assets to determine underfunding
(liability) or overfunding (asset).
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Reporting Issues

Statement of cash flows disclosures



A company reports the cash it paid to fund its pension plan as a
cash outflow in the operating activities section of its statement of
cash flows.
If a company uses the indirect method, the adjustment is only for
the amount of the accrual for the difference between the
expense and the funding. It does not include the amount of the
adjustment for over- or underfunding because that amount did
not affect income.
Vested benefits


ERISA specifies the minimum vesting requirements that companies
must follow.
A company must disclose the vested portion of the accumulated
benefit obligation.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Multiemployer Plans

In our examples, we assumed that the pension plan
is a single-employer plan.


That is, the plan is maintained by one company for its
employees.
In contrast, a multiemployer plan involves two or
more unrelated companies in which assets
contributed by each company are available to pay
benefits to the employees of all the involved
companies.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Other Postemployment Benefits



Other postemployment benefits (OPEB) are
provided to former employees after employment but
before retirement.
Under GAAP, a company must accrue the cost of
these benefits during employment and recognize the
amount as an expense and a liability if the four
criteria for the recognition of compensated absences
are met.
Other postemployment benefits include all forms of
benefits provided to former employees after their
retirement, other than pensions.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Major Differences between
Postretirement Healthcare Benefits and Pensions
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Accounting Principles

The expected postretirement benefit obligation (EPBO) is the
actuarial present value of the benefits a company expects to
pay under the terms of the postretirement benefit plan.



The present value amount is measured as of the balance sheet
date.
It is based on the benefits that employees will receive after their
expected retirement dates.
The accumulated postretirement benefit obligation (APBO) is
the actuarial present value of the benefits attributed to
employee service rendered to a specific date.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Net Postretirement Benefit Expense
(Slide 1 of 3)

The net postretirement benefit expense that a company reports
on its income statement generally includes the following
components:
Service Cost
+ Interest Cost
‒ Expected Return on Plan Assets
+ Amortization of Prior Service Cost
+ Amortization of Net Gain or Loss
= OPRB Expense

The service cost is the actuarial present value of the expected
postemployment benefit obligation attributed to services of the
employees during the current period.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Net Postretirement Benefit Expense
(Slide 2 of 3)

The interest cost is the increase in the accumulated
postretirement benefit obligation due to the passage of time.
 Interest cost is calculated as follows:
Interest Cost =

Accumulated Postretirement Benefit Obligation at the
Beginning of the Period × Discount Rate
The expected return on plan assets is the expected increase in
the plan assets due to investing activities. The expected return
is calculated as follows:
Expected Return =
Fair Value of Plan Assets at the Beginning of the
Period × Expected Long-Term Rate of Return on
Plan Assets
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Net Postretirement Benefit Expense
(Slide 3 of 3)

The prior service cost is the increase (decrease) in the
accumulated postretirement benefit obligation that results from
plan amendments (and at the initiation of the plan).



The prior service cost is amortized by assigning an equal amount to
each remaining year of service until full eligibility for benefits is
reached for each plan participant active at the date of the
amendment.
Straight-line amortization over the average remaining years of
service to full eligibility is also allowed for simplicity.
Net gains or losses are changes in the amount of either the
accumulated postretirement benefit obligation or fair value of
the plan assets resulting from experience different from that
assumed, or from changes in assumptions.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Other Pension Terminology



Because a company usually does not fund the plan, it
increases a liability, accrued postretirement benefit cost,
each period by an amount equal to the expense.
Attribution is the process of assigning the cost of
postretirement benefits to periods of employee service.
The measurement of the accumulated postretirement benefit
obligation at the full eligibility date is based on the benefits
an employee is expected to receive and the expected
retirement date. This results in the attribution period
(recognition period) and the measurement period being
different.
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Attribution Period and
Liability Measurement for OPRBs
© 2013 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.