Retirement Plans

9 Months Ended

Sep. 30, 2013

Compensation and Retirement Disclosure [Abstract]

Retirement Plans

Retirement Plans

We maintain five contributory defined benefit pension plans in the United Kingdom, Ireland and Holland to provide retirement benefits to eligible employees. It is our policy to fund the minimum annual contributions required by applicable regulations. We use a December 31 measurement date for our plans. 

Net periodic pension cost consisted of the following for the three and nine months endedSeptember 30, 2013 and 2012 is as follows ($ in thousands):

	Three Months Ended			Three Months Ended		Nine Months Ended		Nine Months Ended
	September 30, 2013			September 30, 2012		September 30, 2013		September 30, 2012
Employer service cost - benefits earned during the period	$	956		986		2,857		2,970
Interest cost on projected benefit obligation	3,545			3,538		10,601		10,605
Expected return on plan assets	(4,930		)	(4,321	)	(14,741	)	(12,941	)
Net amortization of deferrals	528			524		1,579		1,569
Recognized actuarial loss	39			39		115		117
Net periodic pension cost	$	138		766		411		2,320

The expected return on plan assets, included in net periodic pension cost, is based on forecasted long-term rates of return on plan assets of each individual plan; expected returns range from 4.7% to 6.6%.

For the three months ended September 30, 2013 and 2012, we made payments of $4.2 million and $3.5 million, respectively, to these plans. For the nine months endedSeptember 30, 2013 and 2012, we made payments of $10.3 million and $8.1 million, respectively, to these plans.

We expect to contribute an additional $2.2 million to these plans in the last three months of 2013, for a total of $12.5 million in 2013. We made $13.1 million of contributions to these plans during the year ended December 31, 2012.