The Department of Labor’s Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) announced via Field Assistance Bulletin on December 8, 2014 that apprenticeship plans can pay expenses for skills competitions within reasonable boundaries. The costs to administer the plan may include skills competitions expenses such as those for transportation, accommodations, meals, and registration fees. These and other expenses paid toward the skills competitions are payable by the apprenticeship plan if considered to be beneficial to the plan’s objective. These costs are viewed “as costs of administering the plan,” as stated by the Department of Labor’s Employee Benefits Security Administration’s Field Assistance Bulletin 2014-02.
The Department of Labor has issued background as well as a series of questions and answers in the bulletin on apprenticeship and training plan expenses. For a direct link to the bulletin please select the link below.