Another Try Coming on Speedier Matching Contributions

The House Government Reform Committee has said it will revisit a proposal that nearly cleared the last Congress as part of the law eliminating the open seasons. That proposal would make newly hired employees eligible for agency matching contributions immediately, rather than imposing the open season-related waiting period on those contributions. That can produce a wait of up to close to a year, depending on how the hiring date coincided with the open season cycle. The committee said it dropped the plan to speed up those contributions because it “sought to minimize” the open season bill’s effect on the federal budget, but that it now “intends to consider legislation that would allow for changes in contributions to take immediate effect.”