ERISA Litigation: A Look Around The Bend

Employee benefit plan sponsors are adept at keeping one eye on the present and another on the future. This may be because decisions relating to employee benefit plans often take many months of advance planning to implement. As a result, predicting the future, and the change that it can bring, is a necessary part of being a good employee benefits professional and plan fiduciary. Among the changes that plan fiduciaries must consider as they manage their plans are those that affect the workforce, changes in investment markets and regulatory changes. Often overlooked, however, is keeping a trained eye on trends affecting employee benefit plan litigation. For instance, in regard to retirement plans, plan fiduciaries may be under the impression that litigation has primarily taken the form of excessive fees and stock drop litigation, and plan sponsors have been able, in many cases, to defend such lawsuits. While this may be true to some extent, plan fiduciaries should have a