Some confusion has arisen over regs issued in January regarding new required minimum distribution rules for qualified plans.

The preamble to the new regs stated that for distributions in 2001 or later years, plan sponsors were permitted, but not required to, follow the proposed regulations by adopting a model amendment contained in the preamble. The preamble later stated that IRA owners could rely on the new rules for 2001 distributions regardless of whether or not their plans contained the model amendment.

Since no such statement was made regarding qualified plans, many people interpreted the provisions to mean that qualified plan participants could only use the new rules for 2001 distributions if their plans had adopted the model amendment.

However, a recent IRS announcement confirms that distributions can be determined using the new rules even from plans that have not adopted the model amendment.