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Fiduciary duties — Benefits

To protect employee benefit plan participants and beneficiaries, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) prohibits certain conduct involving benefit plans, and imposes specific duties and obligations on employers, plan fiduciaries, and plan administrators. Some of these duties and obligations are spelled out very specifically, such as the duty to provide a summary plan description (SPD) to participants within specified deadlines. However, other duties imposed under ERISA are more general, both in scope and in application. Among the general duties established by ERISA is the duty of a fiduciary to meet ERISA’s standards for fiduciary conduct when acting as a fiduciary with respect to a plan.

The importance of fiduciary responsibilities 

Familiarity with ERISA’s fiduciary requirements is important because deviating from those requirements can result in personal liability. ERISA gives the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) the power to enforce compliance with the prohibitions and most of the duties that arise under ERISA. However, ERISA also permits plan participants to seek appropriate equitable relief to redress violations of ERISA’s general fiduciary standards and a wide range of specific statutory violations. Civil actions brought by the DOL or by plan participants can result in judgments imposing...


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