Employee Benefits & ERISA :: Overview

Our employee benefits attorneys assist clients on a vast array of employee benefits matters. We work with our clients in plan design and compliance of retirement plans, health and welfare plans and non-qualified plans. Because we work so closely with our clients in plan design and implementation, our employee benefits attorneys have significant experience with the federal regulatory agencies that oversee such plans, including the Department of Labor (“DOL”), the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) and the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (“PBGC”). We also assist our clients with day-to-day plan operation and administration, such as reviewing qualified domestic relations orders (“QDRO”) and responding to plan distribution inquiries.

Our employee benefits attorneys assist with employee benefits issues that arise in complex corporate transactions. Our team also works extensively with senior-level executives in developing and structuring executive compensation arrangements. Combining our employee benefits attorneys’ expertise with our business and labor and employment litigators, we are able to strategize and address procedural and substantive issues that give us a competitive advantage in ERISA and employee benefits litigation.

Clients

Our clients include closely-held companies, middle-market companies, third party administrators and financial institutions. We also assist and work extensively with investment managers, third party administrators, banks and other service providers in connection with their business activities that involve both ours and their benefit plan clients.

Services

At Kegler, Brown, Hill & Ritter, we have developed a wide range of experience related to employee benefits. This experience has allowed us to fully serve the diverse needs of our clients, through:

• Preparing and designing plan documents and summary plan descriptions and assisting clients with plan implementation and plan administration of tax-qualified retirement plans, including profit sharing plans, 401(k) plans, money purchase plans, 403(b) plans for tax-exempt organizations, employee stock ownership plans (“ESOPs”), combined 401(k)s and ESOPs (“KSOP”), and defined benefit plans, including hybrid “cash-balance plans.”
• Assisting clients with employee benefits issues in corporate transactions, including due diligence review of target company benefit programs and advise on post-closing benefit issues such as plan mergers or plan terminations or asset and liability transfers.
• Counseling clients on ERISA, regarding fiduciary duties under ERISA, funding requirements, notice and disclosure requirements, vesting requirements and prohibited transaction issues.
• Assisting and advising clients with the internal audit of their benefit plans to discern and effectuate documentation compliance and operational compliance through self-correction pursuant to the Internal Revenue Service’s Employee Plans Compliance Resolution Program (“EPCR”), the Department of Labor’s Delinquent Filer Voluntary Correction Program (“DFVC”), and otherwise.
• Advising and assisting clients on participant inquiries with respect to employee benefit plans and on participant communications, including participant notices and disclosures.
• Assisting with ESOP transactions, including advising clients on federal taxation issues, employee benefit and ERISA issues, and banking and financing matters.
• Advising clients on regulatory compliance, including compliance with Internal Revenue Code qualification, ERISA’s reporting and disclosure, fiduciary, claims procedure and plan termination requirements.
• Filing plan documents with the IRS for a determination of their qualified status under the applicable provisions of the Internal Revenue Code (the “Code”).

• Assisting with plan design and implementation and termination of non-qualified deferred compensation arrangements, including stock option plans, stock appreciation rights, 457(f) plans, top-hat plans, executive compensation arrangements, bonus plans, phantom stock plans and other plans designed to provide executive rewards.
• Split-dollar
• Counseling clients on regulatory compliance with respect to non-qualified plans, including Code Section 409A.
• Counseling employer executives on compensation issues, including excess parachute payments under Code Section 280G.

• Assisting clients with plan design and plan administration of group health plans, including self-funded medical plans, flexible spending arrangements under Code Section 125, and health spending accounts.
• Advising clients on regulatory compliance, including ERISA, COBRA and HIPAA requirements.
• Assisting clients in the negotiation and design of third-party claims administration service agreements and vendor contracts.
• Assisting clients on employee communications.
• Assisting clients with their wellness programs.

• Litigating disputes relating to claims of breach of fiduciary duty, claims for benefits due, to enforce rights, or to clarify future rights under an ERISA plan, claims of ERISA reporting requirements violations and claims relating to multiemployer plans.
• Litigating disputes in federal and state courts arising under ERISA and/or related state law, including claims of discrimination and retaliation, tax litigation and litigation relating to insurance, trusts and securities.