Note 16 - Employee Benefit Plans

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2012

Pension and Other Postretirement Benefits Disclosure [Text Block]

(16)  EMPLOYEE BENEFIT PLANS

We have a defined contribution 401(k) plan for our employees who work in the U.S. (the "inTEST 401(k) Plan"). All permanent employees of inTEST Corporation and inTEST Silicon Valley Corp who are at least 18 years of age are eligible to participate in the plan. We match employee contributions dollar for dollar up to 10% of the employee's annual compensation, with a maximum limit of $5. Employer contributions vest ratably over four years. Matching contributions are discretionary. For the years ended December 31, 2012 and 2011, we recorded $182 and $183 of expense for matching contributions, respectively.

Temptronic adopted a defined contribution 401(k) plan for its domestic employees in 1988, that was merged into the inTEST 401(k) Plan effective September 1, 2002. The inTEST 401(k) Plan retains the matching provisions of the prior Temptronic plan for all Temptronic employees. Temptronic matches employee contributions $0.50 on the dollar up to 6% of the employees' annual compensation, with a maximum limit of $3. Matching contributions are discretionary. The eligibility and vesting provisions of the prior Temptronic plan have been conformed to those for inTEST Corporation and inTEST Silicon Valley Corporation employees. For each of the years ended December 31, 2012 and 2011, Temptronic contributed $81 to the plan.

In addition to the employer matching for which Temptronic employees are eligible, upon the termination of the Temptronic Equity Participation Plan ("EPP"), we also acknowledged that it was our intention to contribute $3,000 in the aggregate to the inTEST 401(k) Plan as a form of profit sharing (not to exceed $300 per year) for the benefit of Temptronic employees. The amount of these contributions approximates the amount that we had been committed to contribute to the EPP as of its termination date. All such profit sharing contributions are at the discretion of management, and will be allocated to employees annually in the same manner in which the shares held by the EPP had been allocated. The vesting provisions for these contributions are the same as those of the inTEST 401(k) Plan. Accruals for profit sharing contributions totaling $300 were made and expensed during each of 2012 and 2011. Through December 31, 2012, we had made a total of $2,153 in profit sharing contributions. We have historically funded these contributions through the use of treasury shares during the quarter subsequent to the quarter in which we record the profit sharing liability, although management has the discretion to use cash to fund these contributions. Historically we have used cash to fund these contributions when our stock price was below $3.00 per share.

During the third quarter of 2012, our Board of Directors approved an amendment to the inTEST 401(k) Plan. The amendment terminated the profit sharing contributions for Temptronic employees effective December 31, 2012. In addition, the amendment conformed the employer matching provisions for the Temptronic employees with those currently in place for inTEST Corporation and inTEST Silicon Valley employees effective January 1, 2013.