For employers that sponsor and administer employee benefit plans, various pieces of federal legislation create a multilayered regime of detailed regulatory requirements. Primarily, employer-sponsored benefit plans are...more
The wide-ranging SECURE 2.0 Act of 2022 (“SECURE 2.0”) radically altered the retirement plan landscape, and is likely to create a significant number of action items for sponsors of retirement plans for tax-exempt entities and...more
If you thought that church plan litigation was effectively over after the Supreme Court’s decision upholding the traditional interpretation of the ERISA church plan definition in its 2017 decision in Advocate Health Care...more
The Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (“ERISA”), the principal federal law which regulates the benefit plans marketed to employers in this country, imposes specific requirements on most employer-sponsored...more
On March 27, 2020, the Eighth Circuit in Sanzone v. Mercy Health, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 9537 (8th Cir. March 27, 2020), ruled on several key issues on the “church plan” exemption to ERISA. As background, beginning in 2013,...more
Many of the provisions of the Setting Every Community Up for Retirement Enhancement Act of 2019 (the “SECURE Act”) do not apply to non-electing church plans, but some do, notably those dealing with certain 403(b)(9) plans and...more
On Thursday, December 19, the Senate passed two spending bills to fund the government through September 30, 2020, one of which (H.R. 1865, the “Further Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2020” or the “Act”) contains the...more
One great about the Internal Revenue Service is that they tell us what they’re up to. They will tell us what their priorities on, so we will know what they will concentrate on. It’s best as a retirement plan provider to see...more
Generally, a 403(b) plan is a retirement planning program whereby a public school or tax-exempt 501(c)(3) organization (including churches) makes contributions for their employees (and certain ministers) to specific types of...more
Having settled many of its attacks on pension plans sponsored by several large church-affiliated healthcare organizations, the plaintiff’s bar appears to be shifting focus to pension and welfare benefit plans maintained by a...more
Last year, in Advocate Health Care Network v. Stapleton, the U.S. Supreme Court decided that a special type of “church plan,” intended to be exempt from Title I of ERISA and many Internal Revenue Code requirements, does not...more
The IRS has once again confirmed that an employee benefit plan maintained by a church or church-affiliated organization is not subject to ERISA unless the plan sponsor makes an affirmative written election to have ERISA apply...more
This month’s Friday Five examines cases applying an arbitrary and capricious standard of review and recent “church plan” jurisprudence, and cases that address the issue of a participant’s burden to prove that disease did not...more
Since 2016, the Internal Revenue Service Tax Exempt and Government Entities Division (TE/GE) has followed a practice of posting “issue snapshots” – technical summaries of tax issues provided for reference purposes – from time...more
Timely Topics - By Shannon B. Hartsfield - The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced on Jan. 18, 2018, the creation of a new division within its Office for Civil Rights (OCR). OCR is described as...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: In Medina v. Catholic Health Initiatives, — F.3d —, 2017 WL 6459961 (10th Cir. Dec. 19, 2017), the Tenth Circuit held that a retirement plan sponsored by Catholic Health Initiatives (“CHI”), a...more
On November 29, 2017, the Department of Labor (DOL) further delayed and extended the applicability date of the 2016 Final Rule amending claims procedures for ERISA-covered employee benefit plans. Previously, the Final Rule...more
Advocate Health Care Network et al v. Stapleton et al, 581 U.S. __ (2017) - In one of the recent opinions rendered by the United States Supreme Court, it was found that pension plans maintained by religiously affiliated...more
Where is your PHI Data Traveling Today? With most vendors offering and pushing cloud computing solutions and offsite data backup, or guaranteeing offsite backup of data they process for you, many HIPAA covered entities and...more
The 2016-17 Supreme Court term was truly a mixed bag for employers. The Court limited presidential power, reined in the appellate courts’ authority to review and overturn trial court decisions regarding EEOC subpoenas,...more
On March 27, 2017, the then 8 Supreme Court Justices heard oral arguments for three consolidated cases regarding the outer bounds of the “church plan” exception under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974...more
Editor's Overview - Welcome once again to Proskauer's newly revamped ERISA Newsletter. As a reminder, readers can obtain the information in this Newsletter as it is published on our blog. Our featured article this...more
It’s hard to keep up with all the recent changes to labor and employment law. While it always seems to evolve at a rapid pace, the last few months have seen an unprecedented number of changes. June 2017 was no different, with...more
This year’s Supreme Court term may be more memorable for the intrigue and political drama taking place outside the Court than the import of the decisions the Court issued. On April 10, 2017, Judge Neil Gorsuch of the Tenth...more
On June 5, 2017, the United States Supreme Court rendered an important decision that will impact restructurings — particularly health care provider restructurings — going forward. The Supreme Court reversed the Third, Seventh...more