Pension Administrator
DeMars Pension Consulting Services, Inc.
in KS

Employee Benefits Attorney
Honigman Miller Schwartz and Cohn LLP
in MI

Coordinator - Health & Welfare Planning and Financials
University of California Office of the President
in CA

Lawyer - ERISA Associate
Law Firm
in NY

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Onboarding New Clients Under the Employer Mandate
January 27, 2015 WEBCAST
(National Association of Professional Employer Organizations [NAPEO])

Affordable Care Act Tasks: Shared Responsibility Reporting
February 5, 2015 WEBCAST
(Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP)

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[Guidance Overview]

Employer Guide for Compliance with the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act
49 pages. "This Guide was developed to provide a reference for employers who offer [mental health and substance use disorder (MH/SUD)] benefits as part of their health plans, informing them of certain key requirements of MHPAEA, the Final Rules, and other federal guidance provided to the industry and offering them a reasonable approach to MHPAEA compliance. It presumes a basic familiarity with the law and regulations and directs the reader to sources where more detailed information can be obtained and reviewed." (Milliman, Inc. in conjunction with the Partnership for Workplace Mental Health)  

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[Guidance Overview]

San Francisco's 2015 Minimum Health Care Expenditure Requirements, at a Glance (PDF)
"The San Francisco Health Care Security Ordinance (HCSO) requires covered employers to make payments toward their San Francisco employees' healthcare costs. The requirement applies to employers with 20 or more employees in the U.S. who have at least one employee in San Francisco.... The HCSO provides that a minimum amount must be spent for each covered employee for each hour paid for work in San Francisco. As of January 1, 2015, the rates are as [shown in this article]." (Buck Consultants at Xerox)  

Federal District Court: Discounted Purchase of Individual Disability Policies by Several Employees Does Not Constitute Employer Plan Entitled to ERISA Pre-emption
"The court well understands why Provident wants to place the ERISA fence around Rosen's state law claims. It would be well worth the effort if Provident could meet its burden of proving that ERISA affords Rosen his only remedy, that is, outside of RICO.... Although Provident asserts that the various policies were issued under the same risk number, ... Provident provides no reason to give significance to this common risk number while conceding that the policies were individually underwritten ... These [and other] facts are incompatible with Provident's characterization of the policies as part of an 'employee welfare benefit program' and instead strongly suggest that the policies were separate and individual disability policies outside the embrace of ERISA. The decisions to buy policies were voluntary, and the policies were not touted by the employer." [Rosen v. Provident Life and Accident Ins. Co., No. 2:14-cv-0922-WM (N.D. Ala. Jan. 21, 2015).] Editor's note: the opinion's author is District Judge William M. Acker Jr., who has testified to Congress about his views on ERISA's application to disability claims.] (U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama)  

ERISA Advisory Council Report: 408(b) Fee Disclosure Regs Should Be Applied to Pharmacy Benefit Manager Compensation
"In 2012, the [DOL] issued regulations requiring providers to disclose direct and indirect compensation to pension plans (Section 408(b)(2) Regulations).... [T]he Council recommends that the Department should consider making Section 408(b)(2) Regulations applicable to welfare plan arrangements with [pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs)], and thereby deem such arrangements reasonable only where PBMs disclose direct and indirect compensation, including compensation paid among related parties such as subcontractors, in a manner consistent with current Section 408(b)(2) Regulations. The Council also recommends that the Department should consider issuing guidance to assist plan sponsors in determining whether to and how to conduct a PBM audit of direct and indirect compensation." (Advisory Council on Employee Welfare and Pension Benefit Plans)  

Can an Employer Require an Employee to Work During FMLA Leave?
"There is no right under the FMLA 'to be left alone' or be allowed to skirt the employer's 'discrete inquiries.' But if looks like work, it's gonna be work, and an employee shouldn't be doing work while on FMLA leave.... As a general rule, an employee on leave should be fully relieved of their work and not asked to perform work while on leave. That said, ... it is unlikely to be an FMLA violation when an employer makes sporadic calls to an employee posing general questions or to wrap up a job the absent employee was working on. Similarly, the employer can contact the employee to check on return dates or possible extension of leave." (FMLA Insights)  

Employer Violated Wisconsin FMLA When It Terminated Unauthorized Worker Who Took Medical Leave
"Undocumented employees, the court reasoned, are like at-will employees: the fact they do not have a right to continued employment does not excuse employers from following the employment laws. There is also an important policy consideration. If employers could skirt liability by hiring undocumented workers, then the Immigration and Nationality Act, which places restrictions on hiring undocumented workers, and the Wisconsin FMLA, which safeguards employees' rights to take medical leave, would be frustrated." [Burlington Graphic Systems, Inc. v. Dept. of Workforce Development, Appeal No. 2014AP762 (Wis. App. Dec. 23, 2014)] (Littler)  

White House Pushes Bill Requiring Paid Sick Leave
"[T]he Healthy Families Act's 56-hour minimum accrual requirement is more demanding than many of the existing state and municipal paid sick leave laws.... The Act expressly states that it will not 'be construed to supersede (including preempting) any provision of any State or local law that provides greater paid sick time or leave rights.' Accordingly, employers subject to an existing paid sick leave law would be required to comply with the most pro-employee aspects of both the Healthy Families Act and the applicable state or local law." (Seyfarth Shaw LLP)  

Supreme Court to Address Same-Sex Marriage: Effect on Employer-Sponsored Group Health Plans (PDF)
"In the context of employer-sponsored group health plans, such a decision by the Court would affect employees residing in a state that currently does not recognize same-sex marriage (and imposes a state income tax). In these states, the Court's decision ... would: [1] Eliminate the requirement for employers to impute state income tax in the amount of the employer's contribution toward a same-sex spouse's coverage, and [2] Allow employees to pay for the same-sex spouse's coverage on a pre-tax basis for state income tax purposes. The Court's decision may also lead to more state insurance mandates requiring fully insured plans to offer coverage to same-sex spouses on the same terms as opposite-sex spouses." (ABD Employee Benefits)  

2015 Plan Selections by ZIP Code in the Health Insurance Marketplace
"The dataset provides the total number of health plan selections by ZIP Code for the 37 states that use the HealthCare.gov platform, including the Federally-facilitated Marketplace, State Partnership Marketplaces and supported State-based Marketplaces. These data reflect the total number of consumers who selected a plan or were automatically re-enrolled for the 2015 coverage year as of January 16, 2015.... A total of 13,725 ZIP Codes with at least 51 plan selections per ZIP Code are included in the table. These data account for 97 percent of the total 7.16 million overall plan selections in the 37 states as of January 16, 2015." (Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation [ASPE], U.S. Department of Health and Human Services [HHS])  

Too Late to the Game: UnitedHealth Group Blocked from California Exchange
"UnitedHealth Group left California's individual market in 2013, but kept its 3 million-plus member employer-sponsored plans in the state, and largely sat out the first year of the Affordable Care Act exchanges, selling in only five states. Now, after expanding to 23 states for 2015, United wants to sell individual plans once again in California and its public exchange, Covered California. Except that Covered California officials don't seem to want UHG there -- or any new entrant that sat out these past two years and wasn't willing to take a bet on the new subsidized market." (Healthcare Payer News)  

[Opinion]

Who Has Paid Sick Leave, Who Doesn't, and What's Changing
"[A]ccording to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the jump in access to paid sick leave is at least in part due to more Americans working white-collar jobs.... [F]ull-time management workers [receive] the vast majority of sick leave benefits, leaving service workers and part-timers in the dust. The more you earn, the more likely you are to have paid sick leave.... The paradox is that although white-collar workers are more likely to have paid sick leave, they balk at using it; meanwhile, a whole host of people don't have it and thus couldn't use it even if they wanted to. In the end, all of this means that millions of people are going to work sick, albeit for different reasons and with different repercussions" (Harvard Business Review)  

[Opinion]

The NCPA Fact Checks Obama's Health Policy Address During the State of the Union
"The president didn't mention that an estimated 100 million workers who have paid sick leave likely don't get seven days annually. He also didn't mention that his own advisor Jonathan Gruber has research showing workers themselves wind up paying the cost of mandatory benefits through lower wages.... The president should have called for expanding Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) to all workers, allowing them to set aside funds for medical needs. The president could have also proposed allowing workers to use HSAs to compensate for income lost to sick days." (National Center for Policy Analysis Health Policy Blog)  

M&A Basics: Executive Compensation Issues (PDF)
53 presentation slides. Topics: M&A 101; Change in Control Arrangements; Dealing with Section 409A; Say on Golden Parachutes Vote; Golden Parachutes under Section 280G; Going Private Transactions -- Management Representations. (Morgan Lewis)  

BrightScope Launches AdviceMatch to Simplify the Search for Financial Advice and Investment Guidance
BrightScope

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