Mooney Green counsels employee benefit plans and their Trustees in all aspects of establishing and administering pension and benefit plans for the provision of retirement, health, apprenticeship and training, and other benefits to workers and their families. The Firm specializes in multiemployer plans that serve collectively bargained workers across a wide range of industries. In addition, the Firm represents a number of single-employer plans, including union staff plans, and governmental benefit plans. With our extensive experience, we are able to navigate the complexities of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (“ERISA”) and the Internal Revenue Code (“IRC”) to ensure that our fund clients and their respective participants and beneficiaries receive the benefits and protections they deserve.
In serving our clients, we do not take a cookie-cutter approach. We understand that each of our clients is unique, serves a different population, and comes from a different background. We see our job as providing each of our clients with the services that they want and need. The Trustees of the plans we represent are the decision-makers, and our role is to provide them with the best advice possible so that they can make informed decisions that advance their goals.
To this, end, Mooney Green advises Trustees on all aspects of compliance with their fiduciary and other duties under ERISA and the IRC, including:
- Proper management and accounting of plan assets, including plan expenses and plan investments.
- Avoiding prohibited transactions and structuring proposed transactions to stay within the bounds of existing prohibited transaction exemptions.
- Obtaining individual prohibited transaction exemptions, when necessary.
- Fulfilling reporting and disclosure requirements under ERISA, responding to subpoenas and other requests for documents, and development and distribution of required notices.
- Adopting benefit plan design and benefit changes.
- Maintenance and amendment of plan documents, including preparation of summary plan documents and participant communications.
- Ensuring that pension plans remain qualified under IRC, both under their documents and in practice.
- Assisting plans with non-discrimination testing under the IRC, when required.
- Obtaining any necessary opinion letters from the appropriate regulatory agency, whether it is the Department of Labor (“DOL”), the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”), or the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation.
- Administration of claims and appeals procedures.
- Review and qualification of domestic relations orders and medical child support orders.
In addition, we advise and inform our clients, and help to ensure compliance with, the continuing changes in the law and new regulatory requirements, including those arising under:
- SECURE ACT and SECURE 2.0 Act
- Affordable Care Act
- HIPAA, COBRA
- No Surprises Act, Transparency Rules, Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act
- Cybersecurity Best Practices
Even with the best advice, people still make mistakes. Accordingly, Mooney Green has broad experience assisting Trustees with implementing plan corrections, whether through the IRS’ self-correction or Voluntary Correction Programs or DOL’s Voluntary Fiduciary Correction Program, and with compliance with the Code’s nondiscrimination requirements. Similarly, the Firm assists its clients with responding to DOL, IRS and other governmental investigations. Furthermore, in conjunction with its ERISA and employee benefit plan work, Mooney Green also has robust a ERISA Litigation practice, including significant collection and subrogation work, as well as a Legislative/Regulatory practice.
