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Retirement plan fiduciaries have a duty to monitor investment options continuously and remove all imprudent ones, a unanimous U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) recently ruled in a much-anticipated decision. In the opinion, the Court made it clear the fiduciaries can’t ignore imprudent investment options in 401(k)s or other retirement plans even if other, prudent choices are […]
New disclosure requirements should bring more transparency to the health plan side of employee benefits and allow plan fiduciaries to know and understand all the ways, direct and indirect, everyone is getting paid. The changes will help the fiduciaries to identify and assess possible conflicts of interest.
As most retirement plan sponsors and administrators know, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) doesn’t technically require a plan to have an investment policy statement (IPS), but the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), which has enforcement authority for ERISA, has said that having one is consistent with the fiduciary obligations set by the law.
The U.S. Labor Secretary on August 9 disclosed in a short court filing that the Department of Labor (DOL) has submitted to the federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) requests to amend three key aspects of the agency’s fiduciary rule and postpone its applicability to July 1, 2019.
The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) and a third-party administrator that provides employee health benefit plans with access to a network of doctors, hospitals, and other medical providers have reached an agreement in which the administrator has committed to improve its communications with health plans and to return certain fees the plans paid for claims […]
Based on an investigation conducted by the Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA), the U.S. Secretary of Labor filed a civil complaint against Ditch Witch Equipment of Tennessee Inc., an underground utility construction equipment company, and Aubrey Needham, trustee of the company’s profit-sharing plan on April 29, 2014. According to a Department of Labor (DOL) press […]
The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) on June 29 issued its fifth request (82 Fed. Reg. 31278) for public comments on the agency’s fiduciary definition and related exemptions, which took effect June 9. But the latest request for information (RFI) by the DOL since the rule’s inception in October 2010 may not be its last.
Michael E. Weinhagen is the sole owner and president of St. Paul, Minnesota-based Weinhagen Tire Co. and the fiduciary to the Weinhagen Tire Co. Inc. 401(k) Plan.
The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court of Colorado against Central Security Communications Inc., CEO Robert Millikin, and fiduciary Howard Klinger to restore more than $82,000 owed to the Greeley, Colorado-based company’s retirement and health plans, as well as additional lost income, according to a new DOL […]
by Jane Meacham, Contributing Editor The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), in late December 2016, issued an information letter that indicated employer plan sponsors are entitled to use lifetime income products as a part of a prudent qualified default investment alternative (QDIA), even if the products contain certain liquidity and transferability restrictions.