Employee Retirement and Deferred Compensation Plans

12 Months Ended

Oct. 31, 2014

Compensation and Retirement Disclosure [Abstract]

Pension and Other Postretirement Benefits Disclosure

Employee Retirement and Deferred Compensation Plans

Salary Deferral Savings Plans

We maintain salary deferral savings plans covering substantially all employees. We recognized an expense, net of plan forfeitures, with respect to the plans of $7.8 million, $6.4 million and $5.0 million for the fiscal years ended October 31, 2014, 2013, and 2012, respectively.

Deferred Compensation Plan

We have an unfunded, nonqualified deferred compensation plan that permits eligible employees to defer a portion of their compensation. The deferred compensation, together with certain of our contributions, earns various rates of return depending upon when the compensation was deferred and the length of time that it has been deferred. A portion of the deferred compensation and interest earned may be forfeited by a participant if he or she elects to withdraw the compensation prior to the end of the deferral period. We accrued $20.4 million at October 31, 2014 and 2013 for our obligations under the plan.

Defined Benefit Retirement Plans

We have two unfunded defined benefit retirement plans. Retirement benefits generally vest when the participant has completed 15 or 20 of service with us and reaches normal retirement age (age 62). Unrecognized prior service costs are being amortized over the period from the date participants enter the plans until their interests are fully vested. We used a 3.55%, 4.01%, and 3.07% discount rate in our calculation of the present value of our projected benefit obligations at October 31, 2014, 2013, and 2012, respectively. The rates represent the approximate long-term investment rate at October 31 of the fiscal year for which the present value was calculated. Information related to the plans is based on actuarial information calculated as of October 31, 2014, 2013 and 2012.

Information related to our retirement plans for each of the fiscal years ended October 31, 2014, 2013, and 2012, is as follows (amounts in thousands):

	2014			2013			2012
Plan costs:
Service cost	$	470		$	471		$	389
Interest cost	1,277			1,044			1,212
Amortization of prior service cost	662			843			737
Amortization of unrecognized losses	8			144			66
	$	2,417		$	2,502		$	2,404
Projected benefit obligation:
Beginning of year	$	32,136		$	34,319		$	29,766
Plan amendments adopted during year	511			826			575
Service cost	470			471			389
Interest cost	1,277			1,044			1,212
Benefit payments	(971		)	(888		)	(731		)
Change in unrecognized loss	1,183			(3,636		)	3,108
Projected benefit obligation, end of year	$	34,606		$	32,136		$	34,319
Unamortized prior service cost:
Beginning of year	$	3,154		$	3,171		$	3,333
Plan amendments adopted during year	511			826			575
Amortization of prior service cost	(662		)	(843		)	(737		)
Unamortized prior service cost, end of year	$	3,003		$	3,154		$	3,171
Accumulated unrecognized loss, October 31	$	1,703		$	527		$	4,307
Accumulated benefit obligation, October 31	$	34,606		$	32,136		$	34,319
Accrued benefit obligation, October 31	$	34,606		$	32,136		$	34,319

The table below provides, based upon the estimated retirement dates of the participants in the retirement plans, the amounts of benefits we would be required to pay in each of the next five fiscal years and for the five fiscal years ended October 31, 2024 in the aggregate (in thousands):

Year ending October 31,	Amount
2015	$	995
2016	$	1,778
2017	$	2,028
2018	$	2,124
2019	$	2,449
November 1, 2019 – October 31, 2024	$	13,655