OPEB mode
The Full Eligibility topic specifies what criteria must be met by an active member at the time of decrement in order to receive a fully earned or most generous benefit. For example, if an employee may retire at age 62 and receive free retiree medical benefits but must contribute towards the cost of medical benefits if retired before age 62, then 62 is the full eligibility age. If retirement is permitted, in this example, at age 55, then 55 may be the first eligibility age, but the member is not fully eligible at 55. Note that first eligibility is specified elsewhere, under the Eligibility section of the Benefit Definition.
For either a funding or an accounting valuation, service cost attribution may be either accrual rate proration, by component, or linear proration to full eligibility, to benefit eligibility (a.k.a. first eligibility) or to decrement. For an accounting valuation, attribution is usually to full eligibility, i.e., over the period from commencement of service under the full eligibility service definition until the earlier of decrement or the full eligibility age. For details of ProVal’s methodology for attribution under the various options, see our Technical Reference article entitled PUC and UC attribution.
Note that:
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As full eligibility is entered at the Plan Definition level (rather than at the Benefit Definition level), whereas first eligibility is specified separately for each Benefit Definition (by the Eligibility parameters of the Benefit Definition), it is possible to have benefits with different first eligibility in the same Plan Definition, but these benefits must all have the same full eligibility definition. Thus, for example, if retiree medical benefits and retiree term life insurance have different definitions of full eligibility, then separate ProVal Plan Definitions will be needed for medical and life insurance benefits and separate Valuations must be run.
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ProVal does not consider an active member fully eligible until first eligibility requirements have been met for some Benefit Definition included in the Plan Definition. Hence, in the example given in the first paragraph of this article, if there are no other benefits included in the plan and retirement eligibility is defined as attainment of age 62 with 5 years of service, then, according to these eligibility conditions, a member who completes the 5-year service requirement at age 65 is fully eligible at 65 rather than 62.
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Full eligibility is considered to be met for active participants who are older than the 100% retirement age on the valuation date.
Full eligibility is defined based on one of three options for determining when an active member is fully eligible for plan benefits:
1) Age / service / points table. If this option is selected, full eligibility conditions are met at a single date that will not change over the working lifetime of the active member (this is the typical situation). The member is fully eligible upon attainment of the Age requirement and completion of the Service and Points (age + service) requirements, for example, at age 55 with at least 10 years of service. The Age, Service, and Points can be entered as numeric values or Plan Constants. Note that the age requirement always refers to the member’s age. For details about entering values into the age/service/points grid, how ProVal measures age, service and points and otherwise applies these criteria at each possible decrement date (e.g., whether exact or rounded age or service is used), refer to the discussion of the age / service / points grid for eligibility for a Benefit Definitions. If the age / service / points table Varies by a coded field, check the corresponding box and select a valid coded field.
The Service based on parameter defines measurement of attribution service when applying service-based and points-based eligibility conditions for full eligibility, i.e., for purposes of attribution of benefits to the date when the participant becomes fully eligible. You may specify either a database Field or a Service Definition. If you specify a Field, you may refer to a date field from which to calculate service or to a numeric field containing service as of the valuation date. However, particularly if a participant’s attribution period might not begin until a future date (such as for a newly hired employee if full eligibility service is not counted immediately from hire), you may prefer to specify a date field from which to attribute benefits to the full eligibility date. Select the desired field from among the numeric and date fields unhidden in the current project or, if you need fractional service attribution (e.g., hours-related service) or rounding (e.g., count partial years as full years), select from the library of Service Definitions. The 
button accesses the library to create and modify Service Definitions. (See also the Service Definitions and Attribution section of the technical reference article PUC and UC attribution.)
Service will be anticipated to increase by one year per calendar year, or, if you have specified a Service Definition, service will be anticipated to increase according to the Service accruals parameter of the Service Definition.
Note that under the linear proration to full eligibility attribution method, this service basis determines how service is measured for the numerator and denominator of the proration fraction.
2) Changes in benefit component table (i.e., step rates). This option defines full eligibility as following a rate pattern, i.e., full eligibility is redefined for the member every time the rate changes (between decrement ages/dates), with changes according to the step-rate pattern of the selected Benefit Component Table. Thus there may be different full eligibility dates for different decrement dates. To determine the denominator of the attribution fraction, ProVal uses the exact service as of the valuation date anniversary that corresponds to the break point (i.e., the date at which the rate changes) for the “step period” (i.e., period of level rates, until the next break point) in which the decrement is assumed to occur. Thus for any decrement within the step period, the denominator will be the same. Note: if mid-year decrements are assumed, ProVal does not add 0.5 to the denominator for step-rate attribution.
Example: Assume full eligibility follows changes in the participant contribution percentage, which varies based on age and service as follows:
| Retire at age 55 with … | Retire at age 60 with … | |||
| Service | Contribution % | Service | Contribution % | |
| 10 | 90% | 20 | 50% | |
| 15 | 80% | 25 | 25% | |
| 20 | 70% | 30 | 10% | |
| 25 | 60% | |||
| 30 | 50% | |||
The step rates are entered into a Benefit Component Table as follows:
Consider three active participants with age and service on the valuation date of 50 & 30, 50 & 8, and 55 & 0. The table below shows for each participant, for decrement ages ranging from current age on the valuation date to age 65, service at decrement and the proration fraction, i.e., the ratio of current service as of the valuation date divided by service at full eligibility (or service at decrement, if less) according to the changes in the step rates.
| Participant A | Participant B | Participant C | |||||||||||
| Dec. Age | Svc. | % | Prorate | Dec. Age | Svc. | % | Prorate | Dec. Age | Svc. | % | Prorate | ||
| 50 | 30 | 50 | 8 | 55 | 0 | ||||||||
| 51 | 31 | 51 | 9 | 56 | 1 | ||||||||
| 52 | 32 | 52 | 10 | 57 | 2 | ||||||||
| 53 | 33 | 53 | 11 | 58 | 3 | ||||||||
| 54 | 34 | 54 | 12 | 59 | 4 | ||||||||
| 55 | 35 | 0.5 | 30/35 | 55 | 13 | 0.9 | 8/13 | 60 | 5 | ||||
| 56 | 36 | 0.5 | 30/35 | 56 | 14 | 0.9 | 8/13 | 61 | 6 | ||||
| 57 | 37 | 0.5 | 30/35 | 57 | 15 | 0.8 | 8/15 | 62 | 7 | ||||
| 58 | 38 | 0.5 | 30/35 | 58 | 16 | 0.8 | 8/15 | 63 | 8 | ||||
| 59 | 39 | 0.5 | 30/35 | 59 | 17 | 0.8 | 8/15 | 64 | 9 | ||||
| 60 | 40 | 0.1 | 30/40 | 60 | 18 | 0.8 | 8/15 | 65 | 10 | 0.9 | 0/10 | ||
| 61 | 41 | 0.1 | 30/40 | 61 | 19 | 0.8 | 8/15 | ||||||
| 62 | 42 | 0.1 | 30/40 | 62 | 20 | 0.5 | 8/20 | ||||||
| 63 | 43 | 0.1 | 30/40 | 63 | 21 | 0.5 | 8/20 | ||||||
| 64 | 44 | 0.1 | 30/40 | 64 | 22 | 0.5 | 8/20 | ||||||
| 65 | 45 | 0.1 | 30/40 | 65 | 23 | 0.5 | 8/20 | ||||||
Select from the list of tables contained in the current project or click the button to access the Benefit Component Table library and create new tables or modify existing ones.
If the table is age-based, either unisex or sex-distinct, the member’s age, and sex if the table is sex-distinct, is used to look up values at each decrement date. Therefore, if an existing Benefit Component Table that is already used in a component of the formula for a benefit or participant contribution is selected, be sure that the table was created for lookups based on the member’s age and sex, not the spouse’s.
The table service based on parameter is used to define service for look up if the table has a service dimension. The preset option, “<rounded attained age – rounded hire age>” indicates that service will be computed as the difference between rounded attained age (as of the decrement date) and rounded hire age. (See also the discussion of the date of hire (or hire age) parameter under the Active Data topic of the Census Specifications command.) Alternatively, table service may be based on a database field; select from the list of database fields in the current project. You may refer to a date field from which to measure service or to a numeric field containing service as of the valuation date. Note that selecting, by name, the date of hire field of the Active Data topic of the Census Specifications might not produce the same result as the preset option. This is a consequence of the fact that if a database field is selected, truncated service based on the field is used. That is, if you select the date of hire field by name, ProVal subtracts the hire date from the decrement date and then truncates. The result may be lookup service of one year more or less than lookup service computed as the difference between rounded ages at the valuation date and at hire. For more information about table lookups, see the discussion of table interface. If you need fractional service attribution (e.g., hours-related service) or rounding (e.g., completed years), select from the library of Service Definitions. The button accesses the library to create and modify Service Definitions. (See also the Service Definitions and Attribution section of the technical reference article PUC and UC attribution.)
Note that under the linear proration to full eligibility attribution method, the table service parameter setting determines how service is measured for the numerator and denominator of the proration fraction.
3) First age at which retirement rate is 1. If this option is selected, full eligibility conditions are met at the 100% retirement age, i.e., the decrement date at which the retirement rate first becomes 1. Thus full eligibility conditions are met at a single date that will not change over the working lifetime of the active member and that date is also when the member is entirely removed from active status, so that there is never a normal cost or service cost associated with a fully-eligible member. This option is appropriate when, for example, the benefit accrues over service without limit, such that full eligibility is never attained before the decrement occurs. Under this option, the attribution pattern for any Benefit Definition (initiated by any contingency) is the same as would be produced if “linear proration to decrement” attribution had been selected for the Benefit Definition, instead of “linear proration to full eligibility”. Note that it is the total APBO that will be the same under this option as if one of the other two full eligibility definitions were selected, along with “linear proration to decrement“ attribution; the split of APBO between the fully eligible and not fully eligible categories will, however, differ.