IAS 19 Amendments - Defined Benefit Plans ED

The IASB published its Discussion Paper (DP) Preliminary Views on Amendments to IAS 19 Employee Benefits (the DP) at the end of March 2008. EFRAG issued its comment letter on the DP on 17 October 2008.

The IASB issued its exposure draft (ED) in April 2010. Key points were:

•  Elimination of the corridor approach

•  Immediate recognition of unvested plan costs when an amendment is made

• Disaggregation of the plan costs into differenet components

• Disclosures

• Other issues

On 15 September 2010 EFRAG issued its final comment letter on the ED. Basically, EFRAG supported certain proposals but only in the context of a short-term solution and encouraged the IASB to undertake a more fundamental review of IAS 19.

Based on the comments received in response to the ED, the IASB redeliberated the proposals and issued the new IAS 19 in June 2011. The content of the amendments are not only those included in the ED, but also some amendments related to termination benefits as a result of the IASB's redeliberations on the Exposure Draft Amendments to IAS 37 Provisions, Contingent Liabilities and Contingent Assets and IAS 19 Employee Benefits issued in 2005.

EFRAG issued on 28 July 2011 an Invitation to Comment relating to the endorsement of the Amendments for use in the European Union and European Economic Area. It was consulting both on its assessment of the Amendments against the technical criteria for the endorsement in the EU and on its initial assessment of the costs and benefits that would arise from the implementation and application of the Amendments in the EU. EFRAG's had tentatively decided that the IAS 19 (as amended in June 2011) satisfied the technical criteria for EU endorsement and EFRAG should therefore recommend its endorsement. Comments were requested by 29 September 2011. Based on the comments received, EFRAG agreed in October 2011 to issue to the European Commission both the positive endorsement advice and the Effect Study Report.

The Amendments to IAS 19 Employee Benefits were officially published in the Official Journal on 6 June 2012.