What's New - 7/96

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Previous Month ~ July 1996 ~ Following Month

7/30: IRS Okays Radial Keratotomy as a Deductible Medical Expense, from Thompson Publishing Group

7/27: Not All Pension Benefits Are Safe After Patterson describes the bankruptcy aspects of pension benefits after the U.S. Supreme Court case of Patterson v. Shumate. From Reish & Luftman's ERISA Bankruptcy Report.

7/25: Take a look at the Investment Management and Trust Exchange, a Web site providing information, services, and a forum for the investment management and trust industry.

7/25: Read about 401(k) credit card loans in Bank to test low-rate credit card tied to retirement account, from CNN Financial News (June 24, 1996)

7/23: From the Purdue University Insurance Marketing Institute: "Purdue University's Insurance Marketing Institute proudly announces the 40th Anniversary Purdue Pension School, October 7-10, 1996 at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. The school consists of a one day Qualified Plan Fundamentals Seminar, a two day Plan Design & Compliance Seminar, and a one day Marketing Seminar. Speakers include noted estate planning attorney Andrew J. Fair, ASPA President Mike Callahan, and ASPA Executive Director Chet Salkind. Because this is both Purdue Pension's 49th and ASPA's 30th anniversaries (the first ASPA meeting was at Purdue in 1966), we have assembled an outstanding group of speakers who will cover all the timely pension topics, including the pension provisions of the Small Business Job Protection Act of 1996. For further information, contact Joel Zobitz at Purdue (800-359-2968, ext. 95)."

7/22: Senate approves pension reform legislation on July 9; now to go to Conference Committee

7/22: "Our employees are entitled to continue COBRA coverage for medical and dental coverages. Can they continue their dental coverage even after they become entitled to Medicare?" Check the COBRA Q&A Column to find out!

7/22: "An employee suddenly stopped sending in his COBRA premiums. I did not receive any notice from him on whether or not he wished to continue his COBRA coverage. His payment was already a month late when I phoned him to inquire about his status. It took several attempts to reach him until we finally discovered that he no longer wanted the coverage. What is the procedure for cancelling COBRA coverage for non-payment? How long do you wait?" Check the COBRA Q&A Column to find out!

7/22: "I have seen COBRA explanation letters that just say if you are disabled at the time of your loss of coverage (and are still disabled) you may qualify for COBRA's 11-month disability extension. But I thought a person had to receive a Social Security disability determination. Is this the case? If so, what is the deadline for submitting that determination to the plan administrator?" Check the COBRA Q&A Column to find out!

7/22: "An employee got divorced two years ago but never told us. Therefore, we never sent a COBRA notice to his ex-wife. She has run up a substantial amount of medical expenses. We are not positive that we gave the employee (or the spouse) an initial COBRA notice when he and his spouse first became covered by our plan. Do we have any responsibility to this ex-spouse, even though she did not provide notice to us within 60 days of the divorce?" Check the COBRA Q&A Column to find out!

7/22: International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans offers a Multiemployer Fund Salaried Administrators Compensation Survey summarizing compensation data of interest to salaried administrators. The analysis takes into account numerous factors including the number of employees working in the trust fund office, years of experience in multiemployer trust fund administration and number of contributing employers.

7/19: New PBGC Regulations, in Hypertext Format! Brought to you by the happy HTML-elves at BenefitsLink. (The PBGC reformatted and revised all of its regulations on June 27; see their press release.)

7/13: "Where, oh where, can I find objective advice about cafeteria plans and documents without any particular product bias?" Try this: new sponsor Value Design of Midland TX

7/13: Every plan administrator should understand and apply the qualified plan and COBRA rules summarized in the W F Corroon Alert for June, 1996 entitled Processing Terminating Employees

7/13: Review the excellent W F Corroon Alert for May, 1996 entitled Medical Records: Information Gathering and Confidentiality

7/10: Looking for billing administration for group insurance? Cafeteria plan administration? Group life and disability products? Check out The Reppond Company, Inc.

7/10: Look into the Pension Information Exchange (PIX) computer BBS for benefits practitioners!

7/10: QUESTION: In 1989, an employee went out on a long-term disability (LTD) leave. Our company, a for-profit company, has a policy that automatically provides three months of employer-paid medical and dental coverage after LTD begins. This employee had family medical and dental coverage, which was continued for the three-month period without cost to the employee. Under our policy, we begin to measure COBRA coverage from the end of the three-month free coverage period. However, COBRA was not offered in this case and coverage was dropped. In June 1996, this mistake was discovered and a COBRA letter was mailed immediately. What is our potential liability? Check the COBRA Q&A Column to find out!

7/9: QUESTION: I run a small not-for-profit program which has fewer than 10 employees. I am being asked more frequently about COBRA coverage when employees terminate employment. Does COBRA only apply to group health plans with 20 or more employees? Can a smaller group of employees choose to be subject to COBRA's requirements? Check the COBRA Q&A Column to find out!

7/9: New sponsor Sharp Benefits specializes in Qualified Annuity Consulting and Placement. Sharp Benefits represents all insurance companies in the market for both Group Terminal Funding contracts for terminating defined benefit plans and individual retirees from ongoing plans.

7/9: New sponsor KWT Consultants, Inc. offers independent employee benefit consulting and actuarial services, with a state-of-the-art daily 401(k) system that provides access to hundreds of mutual funds at a low cost.

7/4: Reish & Luftman Report on Retirement Plans of Tax Exempt Organizations, for June 1996. This issue discusses the IRS' TVC procedures for 403(b) annuity programs.

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