A chart outlines remedial amendment cycles for defined contribution, defined benefit, and 403(b) plans.  MORE >>

This IRS web page provides a list of taxes to be reported on Form 5330, and describes electronic filing requirements for this form.  MORE >>

"EBSA updated the formatting of the notice to move contact information up front and uses bullet points so that the notice is easier to read. It is still really long, though. [FAB 2025-02] addresses that reasonable estimates can be used for the participant counts in the notice year (Q&A 8), clarifies how to calculate the average rate of return on plan assets (Q&A 9), and clarifies that the standard for disclosing material events has not changed (Q&A 11)."  MORE >>

"The appeals court judges didn't address the merits of the complaint -- only the District Court judge's interpretation of guidelines governing timeliness of filing an ERISA lawsuit.... Plaintiffs sued in June 2022 -- later amending the complaint in August 2022 -- alleging that calculations for married retirees violated ERISA because they weren't 'actuarially equivalent' to calculations for single retirees." [Knight v. International Business Machines Corp., No. 24-1281 (2d Cir. Apr. 3, 2025; unpub., on appeal from S.D.N.Y. No. 22-4592 Apr. 4, 2024)]  MORE >>

"The idea behind PEPs sounds simple: Employers pool their resources to leverage collective buying power, reduce costs, and improve efficiency. However, in practice, PEPs vary widely depending on the provider's focus. Understanding these variations is crucial ... [Here] are some of the PEP design features and considerations for employers."  MORE >>

"There is one strategy that sponsors of underfunded plans can use to reduce PBGC variable-rate premiums (VRPs) that simply involves an acceleration of contributions otherwise due in 2025/2026. By frontloading contributions that, in any case, must be paid to the plan within the next 1-5 months, a sponsor of an underfunded plan can (generally) reduce real, out-of-pocket VRP costs."  MORE >>

"Wilshire estimates that the aggregate funded ratio was 77.3% at FYE 2024, which represents a 2.5% increase from FYE 2023. Wilshire's estimate of the aggregate funded ratio as of December 31, 2024 is 79.4%. The 2.1% increase from our FYE 2024 measurement stems primarily from strong performance across most asset classes[.]"  MORE >>

"[This letter] was sent to an educator by an Equitable employee. Keep in mind that Equitable is a company that was fined $50 million by the SEC for misrepresenting fees. The educator's crime? They did a presentation for colleagues in which they compared someone in a low-cost target date fund (charging 0.08%; hello Fidelity and Vanguard) with someone in an Equitable Equi-vest Series 201 Target 2055 Allocation investment charging 2.3%."  MORE >>

"[1] Periodically reminding employees to update or confirm beneficiary designation forms ... [2] Reviewing equity award agreements to determine whether awards vest upon an employee's death ... [3] Periodically reminding employees to keep the employer apprised of any changes to the employee's marital status ... [4] Reviewing all benefit plans to understand what benefits are payable upon an employee's death, including the effect, if any, on such benefits if the employee is on a leave of absence at the time of death ... [5] Reviewing insurance policies to understand whether the employer or the insurer is responsible for providing any conversion notice to an employee upon their loss of coverage[.]"  MORE >>

"[T]he SOA is launching a new report series -- the Quarterly Mortality Monitoring Report (QMMR) -- to be released every three months.... This report is the first of the QMMR series, focusing on mortality data through July 2024.... The estimated death rate for January through December 2024 ... was 1.1% below the level observed in 2019. Thus, for the U.S. population in the aggregate, the death rate is now about equal to its pre-pandemic level."  MORE >>