Seyfarth Synopsis: A recent 10th Circuit decision holding that in order for the abuse of discretion standard to apply in litigation the claims administrator must provide participants with actual notice of discretionary...more
Ninth Circuit Affirms Decision Rejecting Suit Seeking Early Retirement Benefits - The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has affirmed a district court’s decision rejecting a plaintiff’s lawsuit seeking to overturn...more
In recent Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) litigation challenging benefit decisions by plan administrators and fiduciaries, litigants have been pleading closely related claims under multiple ERISA...more
In Nichols v. Reliance Standard Life Ins. Co., 924 F.3d 80 (5th Cir. 2019), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit held that when an LTD policy funding an ERISA plan defines "regular occupation" as the way the...more
In Gorbacheva v. Abbott Laboratories Extended Disability Plan, et al., 29 U.S. App. LEXIS 36542 (N.D. Cal. Dec. 10, 2019), the Ninth Circuit reversed a district court's award of attorneys' fees to an ERISA claimant as...more
The Ninth Circuit concluded that a plan fiduciary abused its discretion in denying survival benefits to a pension plan participant’s domestic partner. In so ruling, the Court explained that the plan’s choice of law provisions...more
In an unpublished decision dated May 16, 2019, the Ninth Circuit held that a plan administrator abused its discretion by denying surviving spouse benefits under an ERISA retirement benefit plan to a participant’s domestic...more
The Second Circuit held that plaintiffs’ allegations that the defendant suffered from a “categorical potential conflict of interest”—because it both funded the plan and was the claim’s decision-maker—did not affect the...more
• The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit has affirmed a U.S. District Court's application of deferential standard to the review of an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) administrator's decision based on broad...more
In two decisions issued last month, the Fifth Circuit upheld ERISA plan denials of disability and life benefits, confirming its deferential approach in most ERISA benefit cases....more
Executive Summary: The Fourth Circuit expands the scope of admissible evidence in an ERISA employee benefits case. The very first principle applied in a lawsuit for benefits from an ERISA-governed employee benefit plan...more