Working with the Participation Date

This section discusses how to:

  • Determine the participation date.

  • Handle multiple definitions of participation.

If participation is based on age, the participation date is the same day an employee attains the specified age, subject to any date rounding or plan entry date adjustments you specify.

If participation is based on service, however, the system doesn't necessarily determine the exact date an employee attains the specified amount of service. Instead, the system:

  1. Looks at the service history to find the period when the employee attained the specified amount of service.

  2. Uses the first day of the next period.

How exact this date is depends on how you set up your service requirement.

If participation requires one year of elapsed time, set up an elapsed time service definition to use months or anniversary years. Employees who attain one year of service in exactly a year use the day after their one-year anniversary as the participation date. Results are less accurate for employees who don't attain a full year of service during their first year—for example, because of leaves of absence.

You generally attain greater accuracy in calculating the participation date by measuring participation service in months rather than years. If you use months, the system sets the first day of the next period to within a month of the actual participation date, rather than to within a year of the date.

For greater accuracy, you can create a date alias or a series of aliases that adjust the participation date. You then use this alias instead of the participation date anywhere that you require this information.

Finally, you can set up the participation date using a date alias to begin with, then enter that date alias as the age requirement in the participation parameters. Even though the alias doesn't necessarily reflect the date when the employee attains a specific age, it does reflect the date that the employee meets participation requirements.

Note: The participation date can't be before either the hire date or the start date of the participation definition. The system verifies that an employee is eligible for the plan before providing a participation date.

The system applies the participation definitions that are effective for a given time period.

If your pension plan has multiple definitions of participation set up under an effective-dated row on the Participation Function Result page, include only the last participation definition. Do this by deleting the prior participation definitions so that only the last definition remains.