PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - Forfeitures Under Fire
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - Navigating Fiduciary Responsibilities in a Tide-Turning ESG Era
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - Big Changes to Catch-Up Contributions in 2025
How ERISA Litigators Strengthen Plan Compliance and Risk Management: One-on-One with Jeb Gerth
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - Good News for the ACA in 2025
#WorkforceWednesday®: New DOL Guidance - ERISA Plan Cybersecurity Update - Employment Law This Week®
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - New IRS Guidance on SECURE 2.0 Act Student Loan Employer Contributions
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - Understanding Lifetime Income Products
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - Trends in Recordkeeper Consolidation and Due Diligence
Long-Term Part-Time Employee Eligibility Rules Now in Effect — Troutman Pepper Podcast
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - What the J&J Case Means for Plan Administrators
What Can A Tax Attorney Do For You? A Podcast With Janathan Allen
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - Understanding Fees in Retirement Planning
The No Surprises Act: A Cost Saving Opportunity for Employer Plan Sponsors
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - ESG Investing by Retirement Plans
Employee Benefits and Executive Compensation: Getting Ready for 2024 – Top-Hat Plans — Special Edition Podcast
Employee Benefits and Executive Compensation: Getting Ready for 2024 - Health and Welfare Plan Developments — Special Edition Podcast
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - Auto-Portability: A New Way to Keep Retirement Savings Growing
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - IRS 2024 Health Plan Affordability Threshold May Put Some at Risk
PODCAST: Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion - SECURE 2.0 Act Relief for Plan Corrections
SECURE 2.0 introduced many changes for retirement plans, including updated disclosure requirements for a defined benefit plan’s annual funding notice (AFN). These updated AFN disclosure requirements apply for all plan years...more
Administrators of governmental plans and church plans that are not subject to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) should review the following actions to be taken before the end of 2024 and address what...more
From the 2010 outset of its project to extend ERISA fiduciary status broadly to financial intermediaries, including insurance agents, the US Department of Labor (DOL) has consistently relied on the evolution of the private...more
On this episode of Williams Mullen's Benefits Companion, host Brydon DeWitt discusses a recent ERISA class action case, Lewandowski v. Johnson & Johnson et al., that is a wake-up call for plan fiduciaries managing health and...more
They say that you shouldn’t sweat the small stuff. As a kid from Brooklyn, I do sweat the small stuff. When they say that you shouldn’t sweat the small stuff, they mean that you should not focus your energy on things that...more
Acknowledging uncommon market conditions, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) announced Technical Update Number 23-1 (the Update), which provides a one-time waiver of certain reporting requirements for some...more
The SECURE 2.0 Act of 2022 (SECURE 2.0) provides welcome relief to private sector single employer sponsors of defined benefit pension plans (Pension Plan(s)). Effective for plan years beginning on and after January 1, 2024,...more
Following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Hughes v. Northwestern University, courts around the country continue to articulate the pleading requirements for a breach of duty of prudence claim under the Employee Retirement...more
Many traditional defined benefit plans, such as final average pay plans, offer a lump sum distribution as an optional form of benefit. The amount of the lump sum distribution is sensitive to the applicable interest rate...more
The Setting Every Community Up for Retirement Act (the “SECURE Act”), passed at the end of 2019, adds a participant disclosure requirement that addresses a long-held concern of lawmakers that many participants are not...more
On January 24, 2022, in Hughes v. Northwestern University, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously affirmed its 2015 decision in Tibble v. Edison International, holding that fiduciaries of ERISA-subject defined contribution...more
A qualified domestic relations order (“QDRO”) is a state domestic relations order that assigns to an alternate payee (such as a former spouse or a child) the right to receive all or a portion of benefits payable to a plan...more
After 23 years in the retirement plan business, one thing that stands out is that plan providers are on the cutting edge are usually over the edge....more
Days are getting longer, temperatures are getting warmer, plants are looking greener, schools are letting out, Brood X cicadas are emerging…it can only mean one thing…5500 season is approaching. However, unlike the...more
I always talk about how plan sponsors need to work with experienced financial advisors, third party administration (TPA) firms, and ERISA attorneys on their plan needs. Like with reasonable fees, I believe that the term...more
The Fifth Circuit in Schweitzer v. Inv. Comm. of Phillips 66 Sav. Plan dismissed claims against 401(k) plan fiduciaries related to allowing plan participants to hold a single stock that was not an employer security as a plan...more
On June 3, 2020, the US Department of Labor (DOL) issued an Information Letter reassuring plan fiduciaries that in appropriate circumstances, a professionally managed fund that contains a private equity component may be...more
New DOL information letter sheds light on how US defined contribution retirement plans (such as 401(k) plans) may offer private equity investments in compliance with ERISA. Key Points: ..Private fund sponsors and “fund of...more
Too often brokers and financial advisors think about their client’s retirement plan needs and only think about the 401(k) plan. It’s understandable based on their lack of understanding of retirement plan basics, but it’s not...more
Employers are facing a number of serious challenges that make managing a defined benefit pension plan even more difficult than usual. ...more
Plan sponsors are typically aware that operational errors threaten a retirement plan’s qualified status under the Internal Revenue Code if they remain uncorrected. What may come as a surprise, however, is that operational...more
Eleven cases have been filed against defined benefit pension plan sponsors and certain fiduciaries alleging that the plan’s assumptions—called “actuarial equivalence factors” or “actuarial equivalence assumptions”— for...more
As previewed in our prior blog post, the recently enacted SECURE Act includes many changes that affect employer-sponsored benefit plans and require the attention of plan administrators. Among these changes, effective for...more
On December 20, 2019, after months of uncertainty, the Setting Every Community Up for Retirement Enhancement (“SECURE”) Act finally became law. The SECURE Act makes numerous changes to both the Internal Revenue Code (IRC) and...more
On Thursday, December 19, the Senate passed two spending bills to fund the government through September 30, 2020, one of which (H.R. 1865, the “Further Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2020” or the “Act”) contains the...more