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July Business Services
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Guidant Financial
in WA, Telecommute

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BPAS
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The Segal Group
in CA

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The Finway Group
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The New ERISA Regulations for Disability Claims and Appeals
March 22, 2018 WEBCAST
Jackson Lewis LLP

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Providing Certain Fringe Benefits Now Results in UBIT for Tax-Exempt Organizations
"[Tax-exempt] employers will need to determine the increased cost of the fringe benefits created by the UBIT treatment and evaluate whether these benefits can be restructured with a more favorable design. For example, ... employees can have the amount necessary to pay for [qualified transportation] benefits deducted from their pay on a pre-tax basis. If an employer increased employee compensation in the amount of the fringe benefit, employees could still receive the same benefit and the same cost through payroll deduction. That revised benefit structure would avoid UBIT treatment[.]"
Trucker Huss

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March 1 Deadline for Calendar Year Health Plans to Complete CMS Disclosure
"Instructions related to the online filing discuss the types of information required, including an estimate of the total number of Part D eligible individuals, the number of prescription drug options and which options are creditable or noncreditable."
Lockton

Supreme Court Once Again Refuses to Infer Lifetime Retiree Health Benefits
"A unanimous Supreme Court recently increased flexibility for employers struggling to manage retiree health costs. It ruled that, absent specific language to the contrary, retiree health benefit rights expire along with the collective bargaining agreement containing them -- meaning that an employer can modify those benefits after the CBA expires. This ruling follows the Court's 2015 decision to strike down the longstanding 'Yard-Man inference,' under which retiree health benefits were presumed to vest for life unless a collective bargaining agreement expressly provided otherwise." [ CNH Industrial N.V. v. Reese , No. 17-515 (U.S. Feb. 20, 2018, per curiam)]
Conduent

Supreme Court: Union Retiree Health Benefits Weren't Vested for Life
"In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court reversed, determining that under ordinary contract principles the retiree health care benefits did not vest for life. The 1998 agreement was not ambiguous unless it could reasonably be interpreted as vesting health care benefits for life, the court noted. That was not possible in this case with the clause that ended the agreement in 2004. There also wasn't ambiguity from the tying of retiree benefits to pensioner status, according to the court." [ CNH Industrial N.V. v. Reese , No. 17-515 (U.S. Feb. 20, 2018, per curiam)]
Society for Human Resource Management [SHRM]

Court Explains What Constitutes FMLA Interference
"An Illinois federal district court ... has determined that an employer may have interfered with a teacher's FMLA rights when it requested that she provide a lesson plan and post grades while on FMLA leave. However, the court found that the employer's request for a second medical opinion before approving her leave request did not constitute FMLA interference and that her subsequent termination was not illegal retaliation." [ Hall v. Board of Education of the City of Chicago , No. 14-3290 (N.D. Ill. Jan. 29, 2018)]
The Wagner Law Group

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Leave Management in 2018: More Laws, More Outsourcing
"The overall trend to outsource, regardless of company size, is strong ... Especially for FMLA leave, 40% of companies with 1000 or more employees outsource, as do 27% of companies with 50 or more employees. Companies may bundle their outsourcing to one vendor, with short-term and long-term disability being the most common leaves outsourced to the same vendor[.]"
HR Dive

Employer-Sponsored Wellness Programs Attract Already Fit and Healthy Individuals
"The findings supported the positive effects of incentives on wellness program participation by employees. However, at large incentive levels there is little effect on employee participation. Those who chose to participate in these programs already practice heathy lifestyles and have low spending."
American Journal of Managed Care

New Provider-Sponsored Health Plans: Joint Ventures Are Now the Preferred Strategy
"Since 2010, more than 40 provider systems have formed new health insurance companies or acquired existing health plans.... Provider systems have pursued several approaches to starting new health plans, including building a new plan from the ground up, acquiring an existing health insurer, or evolving from an existing preferred provider organization network or Medicare accountable care organization (ACO) into a licensed health insurance company."
Health Affairs

Hold the Phone! Reimbursing Employees for Cell Phone Use in California
"[E]mployers must reimburse California employees for cell phone use when employees are required to use their personal cell phones for business purposes. Reimbursement is required even if the employee does not actually incur extra expenses as a result of his or her use. However, what is not well understood is how much must be reimbursed."
LaborSphere, a blog by Drinker Biddle

D.C. Marketplace Formally Recommends District-Level Individual Mandate
"D.C. would be the first to adopt its own mandate in the wake of repeal of the [ACA's] individual mandate, but it joins at least eight states considering or studying their own individual mandate. If approved, D.C.'s mandate would go into effect in 2019 and would largely mirror the federal individual mandate. D.C. would also prohibit new association health plans (AHPs) from qualifying as coverage for purposes of the mandate; this means that individuals who enroll in AHPs under future federal regulations may have to pay a penalty under D.C. law."
Katie Keith, in Health Affairs

Problems with the Republican Proposal for Paid Leave
"Advocates propose using Social Security as a benefit bank for paid leave -- the idea is that parents could withdraw Social Security benefits today if they defer collecting benefits later.... [In] the long-run [this] proposal is budget neutral. But in the short-run, the proposal increases Social Security's financial obligations, thereby hastening Social Security's decline toward insolvency."
Cato Institute

New Claims Procedures for Disability Benefit Claims Take Effect
"The new rules intend to offer additional procedural protections and safeguards to claimants seeking disability benefits under an ERISA plan.... [C]laimants must receive an opportunity to review and respond to new evidence or rationales developed by the plan while an appeal is pending.... [D]isability benefit denial notices must contain a 'discussion of the decision' when the plan does not follow a Social Security Administration disability determination or otherwise contradicts the views of the treating professionals."
Latham & Watkins

Tax-Exempt Organizations Face New Tax Penalty on Excess Compensation: Due Diligence and Minimization
"There are a number of ways that affected organizations can minimize the new tax penalty. For example: [1] Maximize benefits under tax-qualified retirement plans.... [2] Consider alternative methods of deferring compensation, such as a Code section 457(f) plan or a split-dollar life arrangement.... [3] [T]he proposed Code section 457(f) regulations ... now provide several methods that can be used to spread these payments out over time, which could enable the organization to avoid accruing post-termination payments in excess of $1,000,000."
Trucker Huss

CEO Pay Ratios Highest at Large Multinationals
"Mega-cap companies have an average CEO pay ratio of 243:1, while small-cap companies (based on Equilar's definition of $700 million to $3 billion) have a much lower pay ratio of 72:1, according to the survey of 356 companies. Similarly, companies with the largest employee base have the highest CEO-median worker pay ratios: firms employing more than 43,000 employees have a median ratio of 318:1 and those employing fewer than 2,300 employees have a ratio of 45:1."
Corporate Secretary

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Transamerica Expands Commitment to TPAs and Small Retirement Plan Market Transamerica

ERISApedia.com Announces S. Derrin Watson Will Provide Replies to Questions Submitted Through Their ?ASK the Author? (ASK) Service ERISApedia.com

American College of Employee Benefits Counsel Invites Questions from Law Students American College of Employee Benefits Counsel

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