Benefit Plans

The Company has qualified retirement plans covering certain U.S. employees that have been closed to new participants since 2003 and frozen since December 2013. Plans that cover salaried employees provide retirement benefits based on an employee’s compensation during the ten years before the date of the plan freeze or the date of the employee's actual separation from service, if earlier. The Company’s funding policy for salaried plans is to contribute annually based on actuarial projections and applicable regulations. Plans covering hourly employees generally provide benefits of stated amounts for each year of service. The Company’s funding policy for hourly plans is to make at least the minimum annual contributions required by applicable regulations.

In connection with the Acquisition, the Company acquired postemployment benefit plans for certain groups of employees at the Company’s new operations outside of the U.S. plans vary depending on the legal, economic, and tax environments of the respective country. For financially significant defined benefit plans, accruals for pensions and similar commitments have been included in the results for this year. The new significant defined benefit plans are mainly arranged for employees in Germany, Switzerland and the Netherlands.

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In Germany, post-employment benefit plans are set up as employer funded pension plans and deferred compensation plans. The employer funded pension commitments in Germany are based upon direct performance-related commitments in terms of defined contribution plans. Each beneficiary receives, depending on individual pay-scale grouping, contractual classification, or income level, different yearly contributions. The contribution is multiplied by an age factor appropriate to the respective pension plan and credited to the individual retirement account of the employee. The retirement accounts may be used up at retirement by either a one-time lump-sum payout or payments of up to ten years. Insured events include disability, death and reaching of retirement age.


•	In Switzerland, the post-employment benefit plan is required due to statutory provisions. The employees receive their pension payments as a function of contributions paid, a fixed interest rate and annuity factors. Insured events are disability, death and reaching of retirement age.


•	In the Netherlands, there is an average career salary plan, which is employer- and employee-financed and handled by an external fund. Insured events are disability, death and reaching of retirement age. In the Netherlands, the plan assets are currently invested in a company pension fund.

Other financially significant defined benefit plans exist in the U.K., Belgium and France.

The Company has non-qualified pension plans to provide supplemental retirement benefits to certain officers, which has been frozen since December 2013. Benefits are payable at retirement based upon a percentage of the participant’s compensation, as defined. In addition to providing retirement benefits, the Company provides post-retirement healthcare and life insurance benefits (referred to as other benefits) for certain retired employees. Retired eligible employees in the U.S. may be entitled to these benefits based upon years of service with the Company, age at retirement and collective bargaining agreements. There are no plan assets and the Company funds the benefits as the claims are paid. The post-retirement benefit obligation was determined by application of the terms of medical and life insurance plans together with relevant actuarial assumptions and healthcare cost trend rates.

The following table sets forth the net periodic benefit cost for the Company’s defined benefit pension plans and other benefits for the three months ended September 30:



	Pension Benefits						Other Benefits
	2017			2016			2017		2016
Components of net periodic benefit cost
Service cost	$	3.6		$	2.8		$	—	$	—
Interest cost	7.9			7.1			0.1		0.2
Expected return on plan assets	(8.6		)	(8.1		)	—		—
Recognized net actuarial loss	1.4			1.5			—		—
Curtailment loss	—			(0.2		)	—		—
Net periodic pension benefit cost	$	4.3		$	3.1		$	0.1	$	0.2

The following table sets forth the net periodic benefit cost for the Company’s defined benefit pension plans and other benefits for the nine months ended September 30:



	Pension Benefits						Other Benefits
	2017			2016			2017		2016
Components of net periodic benefit cost
Service cost	$	10.8		$	4.6		$	—	$	—
Interest cost	23.7			19.5			0.3		0.4
Expected return on plan assets	(25.8		)	(21.6		)	—		—
Recognized net actuarial loss	4.2			4.3			—		0.1
Curtailment loss	—			(0.2		)	—		—
Net periodic pension benefit cost⁽¹⁾	$	12.9		$	6.6		$	0.3	$	0.5

⁽¹⁾ The increase in net periodic pension benefit cost is a result of the Acquisition.

Contributions

There have been no significant changes to the expected 2017 plan year contribution amounts previously disclosed. For the nine months ended September 30, 2017 and 2016, contributions of $20.2 and $3.5, respectively, were made to the qualified and non-qualified pension plans.