As discussed in our January and November 2021 Client Alerts, the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 (the "CAA") includes a number of new requirements for group health plans. One of the most significant changes is a new requirement that became effective December 27, 2021, which requires brokers and consultants to provide health plan fiduciaries with detailed information regarding their services and compensation. On December 31, 2021 the U.S. Department of Labor ("DOL") issued an enforcement policy clarifying these new disclosure obligations (the "DOL Policy").
This Client Alert summarizes the new disclosure rules and the DOL Policy, and identifies next steps for employers and plan fiduciaries to take to help ensure compliance.
ERISA requires plan fiduciaries to ensure that a health plan does not pay more than reasonable compensation for services necessary to operate it. The CAA amended ERISA to establish the requirements a contract or arrangement between a health plan and a broker or consultant must meet to be considered "reasonable."
The disclosures are intended to provide plan fiduciaries with sufficient information to determine whether a broker's or consultant's compensation is "reasonable" and assess potential conflicts of interest. The goal is to enhance fee transparency. The DOL Policy provides that the disclosures should be reasonably designed and implemented to meet those purposes and that brokers,...
Community Notes, which allows users to contribute notes that add context or corrections to posts, was introduced by X in late 2022 and the same model is increasingly being adopted by other tech pl...