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
Several new lawsuits have been filed recently alleging that employers violated HIPAA’s non-discrimination rule by charging higher health insurance premiums to employees who use tobacco products. ...more
Small employers seeking to offer robust major medical coverage to employees and their dependents face daunting price and transparency hurdles. Employers with 50 or fewer full-time equivalent employees, so-called “small...more
The Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act (MHPAEA) generally requires group health plans and health insurance issuers to ensure that financial requirements (such as copays and deductibles), quantitative treatment...more
For calendar-year plans, the 2025 plan year is right around the corner. And even for non-calendar-year plans, January 1, 2025, is a key implementation date for certain plan features. This is the ideal time for plan sponsors...more
The Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) prohibits employers who offer health and welfare benefit plans from discriminating against plan participants on the basis of a health status-related factor, such as a...more
The long-anticipated final rule under the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act (MHPAEA) was published on September 9, 2024. The MHPAEA prohibits group health plans that provide mental health and substance use...more
Open enrollment is right around the corner (at least for employers that run calendar-year health benefit plans), so many employers will be updating their benefit communication plans. Though not comprehensive, the following is...more
At A Glance - In recent months, there have been a number of important developments in the United States relating to health and welfare plans. This list of hot topics identifies the key areas for employers and plan sponsors to...more
The August Monthly Minute highlights new IRS guidance addressing student loan matching programs, HHS’s increases to civil monetary penalties and Form 5330 paper filing updates....more
Recent lawsuits filed against the group health plans of two large US employers underscore the importance of implementing formal welfare benefit plan governance structures that include fiduciary committees comparable to the...more
In a recent article in Managed Healthcare Executive, Peter Wehrwein examines the trend of self-funding of group health benefits by smaller employers who used to depend mainly or entirely on fully insured programs....more
Under Section 404 of ERISA, plan fiduciaries must act for the exclusive benefit of plan participants and beneficiaries and use plan assets only to provide benefits and defray reasonable expenses of administering the plan. In...more
In the constantly changing health insurance landscape, level-funded health plans are steadily gaining ground as a viable middle approach between fully insured health plan and self-funded health plans—arguably offering...more
The US Departments of the Treasury, Labor, and Health and Human Services (the Departments) recently issued much-anticipated proposed regulations under the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act (MHPAEA) to better...more
Based on new ERISA disclosure rules, now is a good time to review the compensation paid to your health plan’s consultant and broker. ERISA Section 408(b)(2)(B) requires brokers and consultants expecting $1,000 or more in...more
On March 30, Judge Reed O’Connor of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas issued a decision in Braidwood Management Inc. v. Becerra (“Braidwood”), invalidating the Affordable Care Act’s (“ACA’s”) mandate...more
In light of the March 30 Braidwood Mgmt. Inc. v. Becerra decision, the Department of Labor, Department of Health and Human Services, and Department of the Treasury (the “departments”) have issued FAQ guidance on how the...more
The most valuable feedback is something you can act on. A broker who takes a consultative approach doesn’t just give you options but uses their expertise to provide actionable insights. Let’s face it—not all Human Resources...more
Starting July 1, 2022, employers that maintain group health plans (plans) and health insurance issuers (issuers) will be required to disclose pricing information on a public website in the form of three machine-readable files...more
The July 1st deadline is quickly approaching for non-grandfathered group health plans and issuers to publicly disclose, in accordance with the Transparency in Coverage Final Rules, price information in machine-readable files...more
Since 2015, federal agencies have been required to annually review the laws and regulations they enforce to adjust applicable penalties for inflation. The idea has been to provide increasingly greater incentives for plan...more
The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) just announced increased penalty amounts for entities who violate the privacy, security, and breach notification rules under the Health Insurance Portability and...more
In Notice 2021-31, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) provides broad guidance in a question-and-answer format on the application of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARP) regarding premium assistance under the...more
Notice 2021-01 recently issued by the Employee Benefits Security Administration, provides helpful clarification on relief from certain participant deadlines issued last year. However, it also provides “suggestions” that plan...more
Two days before the one-year anniversary of the official start of the COVID-19 outbreak, the US Department of Labor (DOL) issued a last-minute notice clarifying its prior guidance that relaxed the deadlines for the Employee...more