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The original “excessive fees” case—first filed in 2006—finally concluded on March 28 with a $55 million settlement for the plaintiffs, one of the largest ever awarded in 401(k) fee litigation.
The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL)’s guidance for locating missing participants in the event of a plan termination has become more widely accepted for finding such participants in a variety of scenarios. But the guidance does not clearly state at what point the retirement plan fiduciary has met its obligation to track down missing participants […]
The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has reached an agreement with the owner of a Manhattan laser surgery center to pay $5 million to its Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) to resolve violations of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA).
A health plan’s lack of a full plan document, and an erroneous reference to such a document in the summary plan description (SPD), did not defeat the plan’s claim for reimbursement from a beneficiary’s medical malpractice settlement, a federal appeals court ruled.
The fiduciary duty rule crafted by the Obama administration’s Department of Labor (DOL) will become applicable June 9, as the regulatory agency continues to review it for possible changes or reversal.
The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) is suing the fiduciaries of a Vermont employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) for violations of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), alleging that First Bankers Trust Services, Inc.’s 2011 purchase of a company on behalf of the ESOP from its two previous owners caused the plan to suffer […]
by Arris Reddick Murphy The Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA)’s Section 404(c) protection is commonly relied upon by plan fiduciaries to lessen potential liability in the event that participants, who are directing their investments in employer-sponsored 401(k) plans, suffer large losses.
Fiduciary status under ERISA “is not an all-or-nothing concept,” according to a recent federal district court ruling that found BP and its North American unit were not liable for their retirement plan employees’ breaches of fiduciary duty. The lawsuit arose from a BP company stock plan available as investment to plan participants that plunged in […]
The U.S. Supreme Court on May 18 unanimously vacated a federal appellate court ruling that found that employee retirement plan participants’ claims about fees applied to their plan were time-barred, sending a clear message that plan fiduciaries have an ongoing duty to monitor investments, their expenses and other related claims within that duty’s statute of […]
On Feb. 24, the first retirement plan “excessive fee” case was heard by the U.S. Supreme Court. It raises the question of how long a fiduciary must monitor its employer-sponsored plan’s investments — or whether that duty can instead be measured at a single point in time. A lower-court ruling had found the ERISA claim […]