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485 Matching News Items |
| 1. |
Proposed HHS Regs on Transitional Reinsurance Program Premiums Will Affect Health Plans
McDermott Will & Emery 
Dec. 7, 2012
"The reinsurance programs are intended to help stabilize premiums for coverage in the individual market during the first three years the state health insurance exchanges are operational (2014 through 2016). HHS is estimating the annual contribution rate for 2014 will be $63 per covered life (employees and their dependents). This will undoubtedly impact the overall cost of providing coverage under an employer-sponsored group health plan and should be taken into account by employers for purposes of estimating cost trends."
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| 2. |
IRS Private Letter Ruling Will Help Clear the Way for 401(k) Plan Student Loan Benefits
McDermott Will & Emery
Aug. 20, 2018
"[T]he IRS concluded that the employer could make a non-elective contribution to its 401(k) plan, where the amount of the non-elective contribution would be based on an employee's total student loan repayments and would be contributed to the plan in lieu of the matching contributions that would otherwise be made to the plan had the employee made pre-tax, Roth 401(k) and/or after-tax contributions. The student loan benefit program detailed in [PLR 201833012] includes a number of key features[.]"
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| 3. |
New Law Will Have Significant Impact on Group Health Plans Insured in New York (PDF)
Pension & Benefits Reporter via McDermott Will & Emery
Sept. 18, 2009
2 pages. Excerpt: [Significant group health plan legislation was passed by the New York] legislature and signed by Gov. David A. Paterson on July 29. The new legislation will extend dependent coverage and expand Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA) protections to health plan participants in the state, and may raise interesting questions in its coordination with the federal COBRA statute.
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| 4. |
Medicare Secondary Payor Reporting Requirements Will Affect Self-Insured Health Care Providers, Captive Insurers
McDermott Will & Emery
Jan. 7, 2009
Excerpt: Section 111 of the Medicare, Medicaid, and SCHIP Extension Act of 2007 added new mandatory reporting requirements for insurers that will now enable CMS to ensure that it has the necessary information to determine when Medicare's financial responsibility is secondary.
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| 5. |
Gender-Affirming Benefits: Best Practices for Group Health Plans
McDermott, Will & Emery, via JDSupra
Feb. 26, 2024
"Fully insured plans must follow applicable state mandates, while self-funded plans generally have more flexibility in plan design. However, employers will struggle with certain state laws related to travel for the purpose of gender-affirming care, irrespective of plan funding. The issues they encounter are similar to the questions concerning reproductive health that have followed the Dobbs decision."
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| 6. |
The MHPAEA Proposed Rule: 'Meaningful Benefits' and the 'Scope of Services'
McDermott Will & Emery
Feb. 20, 2024
"[T]he newly proposed meaningful benefits requirement is separate from, and in addition to, the newly prescribed nonquantitative treatment limitation (NQTL) testing standards.... A handful of comments nevertheless urge the regulators to add scope of services to its non-exhaustive list of NQTLs.... The problem is that a plan's scope of services -- what types of treatments a plan will pay for and in what settings -- is a high-level plan design feature and not an NQTL."
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| 7. |
Chicago Employees to Receive 10 Days of Paid Leave
McDermott Will & Emery
Dec. 5, 2023
"[E]mployees will now receive 10 paid leave days divided into two categories: five days of general paid leave and five days of paid sick leave.... While both types of leave will accrue at a rate of one hour for every 35 hours worked, the two categories have their nuances [listed here in a side-by-side table]."
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| 8. |
Discerning Congressional Purpose from Comment Letters on the Proposed MHPAEA Regs
McDermott Will & Emery
Nov. 8, 2023
"If the final rule looks anything like the proposal, there will be a challenge, the particulars of which will likely include one central question: Is the final rule consistent with Congress' intent in the matter? Dueling comments by the majority and minority members of the House of Representatives Committee on Education and the Workforce and (in the case of the minority) the Subcommittee on Health, Employment, Labor, and Pensions frame the question[.]"
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| 9. |
Long Term, Part-Time Employees: Methods for Counting Hours of Service
McDermott Will & Emery
Jan. 23, 2024
"[T]he new rule has generated questions about whether all employers will now be required to track the actual hours all employees work to ensure compliance with this rule. The recently proposed regulations released by the [IRS] confirm, in what should be a relief to many employers, that the answer is no."
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| 10. |
Long Term, Part-Time Employees: Identifying Those Who Qualify
McDermott Will & Emery
Jan. 23, 2024
"The recently proposed regulations issued by the [IRS] answer the question of who is a long-term, part-time employee in some detail.... [An] employee who might otherwise qualify as a long-term, part-time employee by meeting the minimum service requirements will not be considered one if the employee enters the plan after first satisfying other minimum eligibility criteria."
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| 11. |
IRS Cracks Down on Aircraft Usage by Corporations and High-Income Earners
McDermott Will & Emery
Mar. 3, 2024
"Much of the personal use of corporate aircraft is attributable to travel associated with working remotely and challenges stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic. While the IRS has historically audited corporate aircraft issues ... this is a singularly focused audit initiative."
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| 12. |
How Two Fishing Boat Cases Pending at the Supreme Court Could Rock the Benefits Plan Boat
McDermott Will & Emery
Feb. 21, 2024
"If Chevron is overturned or significantly weakened, new DOL and US Department of the Treasury regulations featuring aggressive statutory interpretations (like the fiduciary rule) are likely to become rarer and more vulnerable to challenge.... [B]ecause employee benefits cases challenging agency actions have only rarely reached the Supreme Court, employee benefit cases may be especially affected by how lower courts apply the result of Loper Bright and Relentless, which in turn may vary by federal circuit and district court." [Loper Bright Enterprises, Inc. v. Raimondo, Sec. of Comm., No. 22-451 (S.Ct. transcript of oral argument Jan. 17, 2024); Relentless, Inc. v. Dept. of Commerce, No. 22-1219 (S. Ct. transcript of oral argument Jan. 17, 2024)]
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| 13. |
IRS Announces 2024 Employee Benefit Plan Limits
McDermott Will & Emery
Nov. 1, 2023
"Most of the dollar limits that are subject to adjustment for cost-of-living increases will increase for 2024.... Plan sponsors should update payroll and plan administration systems for the 2024 cost-of-living adjustments and incorporate the new limits in relevant participant communications, like open enrollment materials and summary plan descriptions."
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| 14. |
The MHPAEA Proposed Rule: Standards of Care and Medical Necessity
McDermott Will & Emery
Feb. 1, 2024
"The Legal Action Center claims that plans sometimes develop their own criteria for determining medical necessity for MH/SUD treatment or use criteria developed by nonprofit clinical specialty associations or industry entities ... [and] asks the Departments to revise the definition of 'strategies' to include a definition of 'generally accepted standards of care' that is tied to criteria and guidelines from the nonprofit clinical association for the relevant specialty.... It is possible for the Departments to rely on the proposed regulations' rules governing parity of outcomes to address [these concerns], although [the] proposed fix seems far more efficient."
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| 15. |
ERIC Amicus Brief to the U.S. Supreme Court in United Behavioral Health
McDermott Will & Emery
Jan. 23, 2024
28 pages. "May a court, at the invitation of an agency in an amicus brief, effectively amend regulations by judicial fiat, providing the agency with an end-run around the APA's notice-and- comment rulemaking procedures? The answer to that question is an obvious no. But the Tenth Circuit below disagreed, decreeing a new regulatory requirement for health-benefit denials that the [DOL], in dual 2015 and 2016 rulemakings, expressly considered and chose to adopt only for disability-benefit denials and not for health-benefit denials." [D.K. v. United Behavioral Health, No. 21-4088 (10th Cir. May 15, 2023; cert. pet. filed Nov. 29, 2023, No. 23-586)]
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| 16. |
Long Term, Part-Time Employees: Vesting
McDermott Will & Emery
Jan. 23, 2024
"[Proposed regulations] provide that employees who enter the plan as long-term, part-time employees must continue to be credited with vesting service for completing 500 hours of service in the designated 12-month measurement period, even if they later stop being considered long-term, part-time employees."
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| 17. |
Long Term, Part-Time Employees: Eligibility Computation Periods
McDermott Will & Emery
Jan. 23, 2024
"[T]he new rule raises numerous questions about how the new service requirement should be tracked.... [R]ecently proposed regulations ... [clarify] that employers can use one of two eligibility computation periods."
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| 18. |
Long Term, Part-Time Employees: Coverage and Nondiscrimination Testing
McDermott Will & Emery
Jan. 23, 2024
"The recently proposed regulations issued by the [IRS] confirm that employees who enter a plan as long-term, part-time employees may be excluded from coverage testing, ... However, ... employers cannot choose to exclude long-term, part-time employees from some types of testing but not others (or to exclude some long-time, part-time employees from testing but not the rest). It's all or nothing."
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| 19. |
Long Term, Part-Time Employees: Eligibility Service and Plan Design
McDermott Will & Emery
Jan. 23, 2024
"[G]iven the added complexity around hours counting and tracking, some employers may want to explore design changes that would help reduce the administrative burden associated with complying with the new rules. This might include eliminating eligibility waiting periods for making elective deferrals or eliminating waiting periods altogether, even those that can still be applied to receipt of employer contributions."
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| 20. |
SECURE 2.0 Roth Catch-Up Contribution Requirement Leaves More Questions Than Answers
McDermott Will & Emery
June 16, 2023
"Despite the many questions that remain, it is important for employers to coordinate with their recordkeepers and payroll providers as soon as possible to ensure that they understand the potential impact of the change, which systems will need to be updated to address it and who will bear that responsibility. Importantly, changes that require payroll and recordkeeping coordination often take many weeks, and even months, to implement and test."
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