Timely Elections of 457(b) Distributions

If you sponsor a non-governmental 457(b) tax-exempt plan for your key management and highly compensated employees, perhaps the most significant administrative task occurs at the time participants sever employment.  Each 457(b) plan has a specified time period by which a participant may make an election to defer payment and timely postpone taxation by electing a future distribution date.  If no timely election is made by the end of the specified time period (“default date”), payment will commence within a generally brief period of time after the default date elapses, which may not be what the participant intended.