The recent theft of two laptops containing information on 40,000 current and former Chicago Public School employees is another reminder that benefit plan sponsors should be asking their service providers how safe is their data. Just how vulnerable is employee payroll and benefit data? Well, if it could happen to Scotland Yard, one the world’s … Continue Reading
It’s ERISA audit time again. The regular tax season is winding down, and accountants will soon be turning their attention to ERISA plan audits. And if you’re a plan sponsor whose plan is subject to an ERISA audit, selecting a plan auditor is a fiduciary function. So here are a few mistakes to avoid when … Continue Reading
It’s now a common event to learn that yet another healthy large company has frozen its defined benefit pension plan. The most recent of which in the news was Fidelity. In many cases, these employers are beefing up other benefits such as an increased match or profit sharing contribution. But very few seem to be … Continue Reading
My very first client was a municipality whose retirement plans covered uniformed police and firefighters with collectively bargained benefits and the civilian employees covered by civil service rules. Somewhere along the line, we drifted away from public employee retirement plans, but now some years later here we are again – working with benefit plans in … Continue Reading
Morton M. Grodzins who was a professor of political science at the University of Chicago is credited with coining the term “tipping point”. Malcolm Gladwell later popularized the term in his 2000 bestselling book The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference. In common parlance, the term is applied to any process … Continue Reading
A few weeks ago a senior producer from ESPN called me after seeing my post that I wrote the day before Media Day during Superbowl Week, Super Bowl teams in the spotlight, NFL retirees in the background. We talked for about 45 minutes as I gave him some background on the NFL Players Association negotiated … Continue Reading
The retirement issues affecting our aging population are not unique to the U.S. The American Association of Retired Persons, commonly referred to as AARP, has a Policy and Research group that specializes in a vast range of topics relating to older adults and aging both domestically and globally. They put together a collection of recently … Continue Reading
You can lose many personal items in your lifetime – your gloves, your keys, or your glasses. They’re small and replaceable items. But your pension benefit is another matter. What if you lose your pension. Not because someone will take it away from you, but because you can lose track of it. It’s not unusual … Continue Reading
More and more, retirees are finding that it pays to have worked for the government instead of the private sector. That’s the headline of a recent article in USA Today reporting that retired government workers are twice as likely to get a pension as their counterparts in the private sector with a benefit more generous. … Continue Reading
Recently I wrote about being careful to properly classify your workers: independent contractor or employee. But what if you make a mistake, and that independent contractor is really an employee. How do you fix it? Here’s how. There’s two aspects to the fix. From the retirement plan standpoint, you can use one of the correction … Continue Reading
Last night’s media coverage in Las Vegas for the NBA’s All-Star weekend had it all: the Skills Competition, the Charles Barkley-Dick Bavetta race for charity ($50,000 going to the Boys and Girls Clubs of Las Vegas), optimistic talk of a NBA team coming to Vegas, legends of the game, celebrity sightings, etc. But there was … Continue Reading
How long do we have to keep retirement plan records is one of those questions that plan sponsors ask when they start to run out of file cabinet drawers. They’re familiar with their reporting and disclosure obligations that they have under ERISA, but ERISA also requires that plan sponsors retain the records that support the … Continue Reading
In the world of ERISA, there are three parties to a divorce: the retirement plan participant, the ex- (called the alternative payee), and the plan administrator. Or, in the proper order: the participant, the administrator, and the ex-. Because the plan administrator is the person in the middle since he or she has to decide … Continue Reading
Once a year – or so it seems – as part of Super Bowl week, media coverage is given to stories about meager pensions provided to the older retired NFL football players. A major part of the reason is that these guys are not represented by the Player Association. But at least, they have pensions. … Continue Reading
It happens. An employee meets the 401(k) plan eligibility requirements, and the employer unintentionally does not offer enrollment at what should be the employee’s entry date. Roy Harmon in his Health Plan Law blog writes about a similar situation involving a group insurance benefit. The title of his post, “Instatement” In LTD Plan Appropriate Remedy … Continue Reading
A partial termination of a retirement plan is one of those things that you know now what you didn’t know then. If it happens, then all plan participants must be fully vested. But there is no clear objective test as to when it happens. What got me thinking about this subject was yesterday’s article by … Continue Reading
Baltimore doesn’t forget its Colts. And one of those former Baltimore Colts, Bruce Laird, (Baltimore Colts’ defensive back from 1972 to 1981 and a San Diego Charger in 1982 and 1983) wants to make sure that his former teammates and other retired NFL players are remembered in a more tangible way than street signs. Specifically, … Continue Reading
Back in the day, pre-ERISA day, many retirement plans had “bad boy” clauses. That is, a provision in the plan under which a participant could forfeit all benefits for being a “bad boy.” That usually meant among other misdeeds criminal conduct. Well, they’re back – at least as far as Congress is concerned. Last November, … Continue Reading
As the retirement plan industry matures (along with the participants), it seems to me as a non-attorney that the scope of ERISA-related litigation has expanded. Yesterday, I wrote about a U.S. Court of Appeals that vacated a lower court decision that certified a case as a class action. Timely, in the context of other law … Continue Reading
While sports fans are looking forward to tomorrow’s NFL games (for me the Beloved Bears vs. the Saints) that wil decide the two Super Bowl contestants, the retired NFL players are looking forward to receiving their pension increases under the new Collective Bargaining Agreement which I wrote about last year. (While agreement on the new … Continue Reading
The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ decision regarding IBM’s cash balance pension plan. In addition, the IRS has begun to review moratorium cash balance plans, i.e, those cash balance plans that were converted from defined benefit plans before June 29, 2005. And with the Pension Protection Act … Continue Reading
Steve Rosenberg in his article today on his Boston ERISA and Insurance Litigation Blog, Top Hat Plans and ERISA, brings into focus one of the inherent problems with Top Hat plans. At least from the standpoint of the employee. That is, Top Hat plans are exempt from the participation, funding, vesting and fiduciary responsibility rules … Continue Reading
That’s a picture of the Golden Globe award given each year by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA). The "no goody bag now going untaxed" is the announcement today by the Internal Revenue Service that it reached an agreement with the HFPA resolving outstanding tax responsibilities with respect to Golden Globe Awards presenter gift baskets. … Continue Reading
Last minute tax planning is like cramming for a final exam. You don’t always get the best results. Starting now to do 2007 retirement planning can make a big difference. Here are some of the situations we saw in late December, 2006: Not enough compensation for a shareholder-employee of an S corporation. Many owners will … Continue Reading
