Map the plan and reporting entity

Cedar Trail's controller receives three documents titled “retirement plan.” One is a 5-percent employer match to participant accounts. One promises a monthly benefit based on final pay and years of service. One is a union plan maintained jointly by unrelated employers. A fourth file promises retiree medical coverage. The label does not select one accounting model.

Begin with those four promises as a routing exercise. The table previews the evidence and accounting consequences; later lessons develop the single-employer pension and other-postretirement rows in depth.

Route the arrangement before touching a number

A sponsor can maintain several routes at once. Do not aggregate them because the note uses one heading. Build a plan register with legal name, sponsor, administrator, trust, plan type, covered population, status, measurement date, currency, significant amendments, funding vehicle, and accounting owner.

Separate employer and plan

Plan assets are held for participants. They are not the sponsor's cash, even when the sponsor appoints fiduciaries or consolidates information operationally. The employer recognizes its Topic 715 funded-status asset or liability. The plan prepares its own statements under the applicable plan-accounting Topic. Posting the trust's securities as employer investments double counts resources and breaks the legal boundary.

The same separation controls benefit payments. When the trustee pays a retiree, the payment ordinarily reduces the obligation and plan assets inside their rollforwards. It is not a fresh employer compensation expense. When the employer contributes cash, the trust receives an asset and the employer reduces cash; the contribution does not become periodic benefit cost merely because it funds the promise.

Open the evidence request

Before the close, request:

• executed plan documents, amendments, board or committee approvals, and collective-bargaining agreements;
• participant census controls and reconciliation to payroll or human resources;
• the actuary's signed report, methods, assumptions, population, and measurement date;
• trustee and custodian statements, investment classes, and fair-value support;
• contributions authorized and received, and benefit payments disbursed;
• opening PBO or APBO, plan assets, funded status, AOCI layers, and prior note;
• settlements, annuity purchases, freezes, workforce events, acquisitions, divestitures, and significant interim events; and
• public/nonpublic status, reporting dates, policy elections, tax facts, and applicable disclosure checklist.

A missing document is not a zero. Put it in the unresolved-evidence register, name the decision it blocks, and assign an owner.

Apply the multiemployer employer route

Cedar Trail's union agreement requires $420,000 of contributions for the year. The company paid $390,000 by year-end. Under the supplied Subtopic 715-80 facts, the employer recognizes $420,000 of pension cost and a $30,000 contribution payable:

Dr multiemployer pension cost       $420,000
    Cr cash                                     $390,000
    Cr contribution payable                      30,000

Do not multiply the plan's aggregate PBO or underfunded status by Cedar Trail's share of contributions. Assets contributed by one employer may support benefits for employees of other participating employers, and the contribution share is not a reliable allocation of the plan's obligation. The employer file instead retains the required contribution, amount paid and due, plan participation, and current disclosure evidence.

For each individually significant pension plan, research the current required disclosures from the plan's latest available information. The controlled file normally includes the legal name and identifiers, plan year, funded or certified status information when available, collective-bargaining expiration dates, employer contributions, any surcharge, rehabilitation or funding-improvement status, and whether the employer provides more than 5 percent of total plan contributions. Describe the different risk of participation rather than implying that contribution accounting makes the exposure disappear.

A withdrawal or contribution-increase exposure is a separate contingency question. Route it to Topic 450 when the supplied facts make an obligation probable or reasonably possible; do not accrue an invented proportional share of plan underfunding. The plan route, contribution entry, disclosure file, and contingency stop together constitute application, not merely classification.

Control the standards clock

Current Topic 715 governs. ASU 2015-04 matters only if the entity has a qualifying non-month-end year-end and a documented consistent election. ASU 2017-07 controls presentation and capitalization. ASU 2018-14 informs the current disclosure checklist. Subtopic 715-80 governs the multiemployer route.

The June 2026 market-return cash balance exposure draft is a proposal. It can change the research queue; it cannot change Cedar Trail's current answer. The plan map closes when every arrangement identifies each relevant reporting entity and the standards route for each artifact or issue. Preserve the employer's Topic 715 accounting separately from the plan's own reporting and from any contingency, tax, cash-flow, or legal analysis. The map also names the facts that remain with the actuary, trustee, legal counsel, tax specialist, or plan administrator.