The IRS recently released updated FAQs addressing educational assistance programs under Internal Revenue Code Section 127. While much of the guidance reflects existing rules, the updates incorporate recent legislative changes and provide helpful clarifications for employers that offer or are considering offering education benefits.
For years, employers have treated fiduciary governance as a retirement‑plan issue. Formal committees, documented processes, and ongoing oversight became standard in response to excessive fee litigation and regulatory scrutiny. Health and welfare plans, for the most part, had been largely ignored. That is now changing.
Recent ...
Recent federal court decisions vacating the Department of Labor’s (DOL) 2024 fiduciary rule have prompted a common and practical question from retirement plan service providers: Does this change affect whether we still need to rely on PTE 2020‑02 for non‑discretionary fiduciary advice? For providers acting as ERISA fiduciaries, the ...
Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) issued Field Assistance Bulletin No. 2026‑01, outlining new principles for how the agency will now approach ERISA enforcement. While styled as internal guidance for EBSA investigators, the bulletin signals where the DOL intends to ...
Employee Stock Ownership Plans (“ESOPs”) are powerful vehicles for business succession and employee ownership, but they operate under a tightly regulated framework. Because ESOPs are governed by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (“ERISA”), they cannot function like typical corporate buyers or sellers. A ...
Retirement plan committee meetings are not the most glamorous part of plan governance. Minutes can feel like an administrative afterthought—something to finalize quickly and file away. But in today’s retirement plan litigation environment, committee meeting minutes are one of the most powerful tools a plan sponsor has to manage ...
Many employers offer popular pre-tax benefits such as health insurance premiums, health FSAs, and dependent care FSAs, assuming that running deductions through payroll on a pre-tax basis is enough. However, one critical component to offering these plans that is often overlooked is that these benefits generally must be offered pursuant to a ...
I’m often asked to review the benefits and paid leave provisions in employer handbooks. Employers tend to focus first on retirement and health benefits, but significant compliance issues show up elsewhere. By far the most common multi‑state problem I see is an attempt to address state leave requirements with a one‑size‑fits‑all ...
Benefit professionals continue to navigate a regulatory environment made more complicated by SECURE 2.0, and one area ripe for confusion is the rules governing age‑based contribution limits and excess deferrals. While excess deferrals can arise in many situations, the new age‑60–63 “special catch‑up” rule provides an ...
As discussed in a prior post, a wave of ERISA lawsuits has challenged how employers use forfeited 401(k) plan assets, with plaintiffs arguing that applying forfeitures to offset employer contributions (rather than reallocating them to participants) violates a plan sponsor’s fiduciary duties. Employers and regulators argue that plan ...