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
A Supreme Court decision in April made it easier for plaintiffs to keep ERISA prohibited transaction claims in play longer, and just days later a rare ERISA trial resulted in a huge win for a class of 401(k) plan...more
Employers that do not timely deposit participant deferrals and loan contributions to their employer sponsored retirement plans can be subject to Department of Labor (DOL) penalties for breaching their fiduciary duties....more
Excessive fee cases against plans governed by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) have been on the rise for the last decade. ERISA litigation is expanding with novel theories such as forfeiture litigation....more
Two recent class action lawsuits charging a breach of fiduciary duty under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) have increased the stakes and raised important considerations regarding a plan fiduciary’s duty of...more
On April 17, 2025, the Supreme Court of the United States clarified the pleading requirements to bring a prohibited-transaction claim under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (“ERISA”) in Cunningham v....more
On April 17, 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a decision that dealt a blow to benefit plan fiduciaries nationwide. The Court unanimously held in Cunningham v. Cornell University that a plaintiff asserting that a plan and...more
On April 17, 2025, the Supreme Court decided Cunningham v. Cornell University, unanimously holding that a plaintiff can state a valid claim under ERISA by merely alleging that a plan used “plan assets” to pay a service...more
On April 17, 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous opinion in Cunningham v Cornell University, addressing the pleading standard applicable to prohibited transaction claims under the Employee Retirement Income...more
On April 17, 2025, the Supreme Court resolved a circuit split on the appropriate pleading standard for a specific type of prohibited transaction claim under ERISA. While that decision may sound dry and technical, the...more
Key takeaway: The Supreme Court held that to state an ERISA prohibited-transaction claim under 29 U.S.C. § 1106(a), a plaintiff needs only to plausibly allege the elements contained in § 1106(a) itself and does not need to...more
In a unanimous decision reversing dismissal of prohibited transaction claims based on fees paid to defined contribution plan recordkeepers, the Supreme Court held that ERISA’s prohibited transaction exemptions are affirmative...more
The most recent wave of ERISA litigation is focused on the use of plan forfeitures in 401(k) plans, with the newest case, Armenta v. WillScot Mobile Mini Holdings Corp. being filed just last week. Although, for years, many...more
Many employer-sponsored defined contributions plans, including 401(k) profit sharing plans and money purchase pension plans include a vesting schedule – a period over which a plan participant earns a nonforfeitable right to...more
Key Takeaways - In October 2024, SCOTUS granted review of Cunningham v. Cornell University to provide guidance on certain pleading standards in ERISA litigation claims, with oral arguments scheduled for January 2025....more
The U.S. Supreme Court recently granted a petition for a writ of certiorari to review the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit's decision in Cunningham v. Cornell University, 86 F.4th 961 (2d Cir. 2023). In doing so,...more
The Department of Labor’s final regulation defining fiduciary status for investment advice to retirement investors will be effective this September 23. Where a fiduciary recommendation results in additional compensation for...more
In our December 7, 2023 post, we noted five class action lawsuits, all filed by the same law firm within two months, in which 401(k) plan participants allege plan fiduciaries violated ERISA by using plan forfeitures to offset...more
The DOL recently finalized amendments to the QPAM exemption that will considerably alter the exemption’s conditions effective as of June 17, 2024 (for a detailed summary of the changes, please see our post here). There are a...more
The DOL’s new fiduciary advice rule, effective September 23, 2024, will cause many one-time recommendations to be fiduciary advice. As a result, many more recommendations to retirement investors—private sector retirement...more
The US Department of Labor (DOL) published final amendments to Prohibited Transaction Class Exemption 84-14, the so-called “QPAM Exemption,” in the Federal Register on April 3, 2024. The amendments are anticipated to affect...more
On April 23, 2024, the US Department of Labor (DOL) released its Final Rule 4.0 regarding ERISA fiduciary investment advice, including amended exemptions for conflicted investment advice. Our initial analysis of the Final...more
For the second time in a decade, the Department of Labor (DOL) attempted to expand the reach (and requirements) of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA). On April 23, 2024, DOL succeeded and announced...more
What has changed with the U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL) final regulations and certain prohibited transaction exemptions (PTEs)? Is it really that bad even for plan sponsors, as we hear from the many critics of the DOL’s...more
Executive Summary - Many investment advisers and other financial institutions rely on the Department of Labor’s QPAM Exemption when providing services to, and transacting with, employer-sponsored retirement plans, individual...more
On April 3, 2024, the Department of Labor (DOL) published final changes to Prohibited Transaction Class Exemption 84-14, commonly known as the “QPAM Exemption”. The changes make reliance on the QPAM Exemption more burdensome...more