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EMPLOYEE BENEFIT PLANS | 3 Months Ended
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Mar. 31, 2016
Compensation and Retirement Disclosure [Abstract] |
EMPLOYEE BENEFIT PLANS | EMPLOYEE BENEFIT PLANS Company-Sponsored Benefit Plans Information about net periodic benefit cost for our company-sponsored pension and postretirement benefit plans is as follows for the three months ended March 31, 2016 and 2015 (in millions):
| U.S. Pension Benefits |  | U.S. Postretirement Medical Benefits |  | International Pension Benefits
2016 |  | 2015 |  | 2016 |  | 2015 |  | 2016 |  | 2015
Service cost | $ | 352 |  |  | $ | 382 |  |  | $ | 7 |  |  | $ | 9 |  |  | $ | 12 |  |  | $ | 12 |
Interest cost | 457 |  |  | 423 |  |  | 30 |  |  | 31 |  |  | 10 |  |  | 11 |
Expected return on assets | (629 | ) |  | (622 | ) |  | (1 | ) |  | (4 | ) |  | (14 | ) |  | (15 | )
Amortization of prior service cost | 42 |  |  | 42 |  |  | 1 |  |  | 1 |  |  | — |  |  | — |
Net periodic benefit cost | $ | 222 |  |  | $ | 225 |  |  | $ | 37 |  |  | $ | 37 |  |  | $ | 8 |  |  | $ | 8 |
During the first three months of 2016, we contributed $20 and $23 million to our company-sponsored pension and postretirement medical benefit plans, respectively. We also expect to contribute $1.216 billion and $78 million over the remainder of the year to the pension and U.S. postretirement medical benefit plans, respectively. Multiemployer Benefit Plans We contribute to a number of multiemployer defined benefit and health and welfare plans under terms of collective bargaining agreements that cover our union-represented employees. Our current collective bargaining agreements set forth the annual contribution increases allotted to the plans that we participate in, and we are in compliance with these contribution rates. These limitations on annual contribution rates will remain in effect throughout the terms of the existing collective bargaining agreements. As of March 31, 2016 and December 31, 2015 we had $870 and $872 million, respectively, recognized in "other non-current liabilities" on our consolidated balance sheets associated with our previous withdrawal from a multiemployer pension plan. This liability is payable in equal monthly installments over a remaining term of approximately 46 years. Based on the borrowing rates currently available to the Company for long-term financing of a similar maturity, the fair value of this withdrawal liability as of March 31, 2016 and December 31, 2015 was $902 and $841 million, respectively. We utilized Level 2 inputs in the fair value hierarchy of valuation techniques to determine the fair value of this liability. In December 2014, Congress passed the Multiemployer Pension Reform Act (“MPRA”), which for the first time ever allowed multi-employer pension plans to reduce benefit payments to retirees, subject to specific guidelines in the statute and government oversight. On September 25, 2015, the Central States Pension Fund ("CSPF") submitted a proposed pension benefit reduction plan to the U.S. Department of Treasury under the MPRA. The CSPF plan proposed to make retirement benefit reductions to CSPF participants, including to the benefits of UPS employee participants retiring on or after January 1, 2008. In 2007, UPS fully funded its allocable share of the unfunded vested benefits in CSPF when it was agreed that UPS could withdraw from CSPF in consideration of a $6.1 billion withdrawal liability. Under a collective bargaining agreement with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters ("Teamsters"), UPS agreed to provide supplemental benefits under the UPS/IBT Full-Time Employee Pension Plan to offset the effect of certain benefit reductions by CSPF applicable to UPS participants retiring on or after January 1, 2008, which resulted in recognition of a $1.7 billion pension liability in 2007. Additionally, UPS agreed to provide coordinating benefits under the UPS/IBT Full-Time Employee Pension Plan to offset certain benefit reductions in the event that benefits were lawfully reduced in the future by CSPF. We vigorously challenged the proposed benefit reduction plan because we believed that it did not comply with the law and that certain actions by CSPF were invalid. In April 2016, we estimated that we would be required to record a 2016 charge of approximately $3.2 billion to $3.8 billion, if the CSPF pension benefit reduction plan were approved and implemented as proposed. On May 6, 2016, the U.S. Department of Treasury rejected the proposed plan submitted by CSPF, stating that it had determined that the CSPF plan failed to satisfy the following three requirements set forth in the MPRA:
• | that the proposed benefit suspensions, in the aggregate, be reasonably estimated to achieve, but not materially exceed, the level that is necessary to avoid insolvency, because the investment return and entry age assumptions used for this purpose in the CSPF proposed plan were not reasonable;
• | that the proposed benefit suspensions be equitably distributed across the participant and beneficiary population; and
• | that the notices of proposed benefit suspensions be written so as to be understood by the average plan participant.
Because the CSPF has asserted that it will become insolvent within ten years, it is possible that CSPF will propose a revised plan under the MPRA. Due to uncertainties, we are not able to estimate a range of additional obligations, if any, that could arise as a result of the CSPF situation, which amounts could be material. These uncertainties include the actions that may be taken by CSPF, the government or others, including whether CSPF will submit a revised benefit reduction plan, the terms and assumptions of any such proposed plan, how the regulations and standards under the MPRA are applied to any subsequently proposed plan, and the effect of discount rates and various other actuarial assumptions. Accordingly, we have not recognized any additional liability for coordinating benefits within the UPS/IBT Full-Time Employee Pension Plan. Collective Bargaining Agreements As of December 31, 2015, we had approximately 266,000 employees employed under a national master agreement and various supplemental agreements with local unions affiliated with the Teamsters. In addition, our airline pilots, airline mechanics, ground mechanics and certain other employees are employed under other collective bargaining agreements. In 2014, the Teamsters ratified a new national master agreement (“NMA”) with UPS that will expire on July 31, 2018. The economic provisions in the NMA included wage rate increases, as well as increased contribution rates for healthcare and pension benefits. Most of these economic provisions were retroactive to August 1, 2013, which was the effective date of the NMA. During the first quarter of 2015, we remitted $53 million for these retroactive economic benefits. We have approximately 2,600 pilots who are employed under a collective bargaining agreement with the Independent Pilots Association ("IPA"), which became amendable at the end of 2011. The ongoing contract negotiations between UPS and the IPA are in mediation by the National Mediation Board. Our airline mechanics are covered by a collective bargaining agreement with Teamsters Local 2727, which became amendable November 1, 2013. We are currently in negotiations with Teamsters Local 2727 for a new agreement. In addition, approximately 3,100 of our auto and maintenance mechanics who are not employed under agreements with the Teamsters are employed under collective bargaining agreements with the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (“IAM”) that will expire on July 31, 2019.

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