Pension Benefit Obligations

3 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2015

6.Pension Benefit Obligations

In the U.S., the Company sponsors various qualified defined benefit pension plans. The legacy AECOM defined benefit plan covers substantially all permanent AECOM employees hired as of March 1, 1998. The other recently acquired plans cover employees of URS and the Hunt Corporation at the time of their acquisition. Benefits under these plans generally are based on the employee’s years of creditable service and compensation. All defined benefit plans are closed to new participants and all defined benefit plans, except the URS Federal Services, Inc. Employees Retirement Plan, have frozen accruals as of December 31, 2015. The Company adopted an amendment to freeze benefits under the URS Federal Services, Inc. Employees Retirement Plan during the three months ended December 31, 2015, which resulted in the curtailment gain listed below. The Company also sponsors various non-qualified plans in the U.S.; all of these plans are frozen. Outside the U.S., the Company sponsors various pension plans, which are appropriate to the country in which the Company operates, some of which are government mandated.

The following table details the components of net periodic cost for the Company’s pension plans for the three months ended December 31, 2015 and 2014:

	Three Months Ended
	December 31, 2015						December 31, 2014
	U.S.			Int’l			U.S.			Int’l
	(in millions)
Components of net periodic (benefit) cost:
Service costs	$	1.8		$	0.3		$	1.5		$	0.3
Interest cost on projected benefit obligation	5.7			10.5			6.4			11.3
Expected return on plan assets	(7.8		)	(12.8		)	(6.7		)	(11.9		)
Amortization of prior service cost	—			(0.1		)	—			(0.1		)
Amortization of net loss	1.0			1.4			1.1			1.5
Curtailment gain recognized	(6.8		)	—			—			—
Settlement (gain) loss recognized	(1.0		)	0.1			—			0.4

Net periodic (benefit) cost	$	(7.1	)	$	(0.6	)	$	2.3		$	1.5

The total amounts of employer contributions paid for the three months ended December 31, 2015 were $5.7 million for U.S. plans and $5.4 million for non-U.S. plans. The expected remaining scheduled annual employer contributions for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2016 are $9.2 million for U.S. plans and $15.5 million for non-U.S. plans. The aggregate pension deficit was $550.9 million and $572.6 million as of December 31, 2015 and September 30, 2015, respectively. The long-term portion of the aggregate pension deficit was $544.1 million and $565.3 million as of December 31, 2015 and September 30, 2015, respectively.