More than 3,000 pre-1993 Alcoa retirees sued when the company terminated their lifetime retiree healthcare benefits in 2021. On Friday the Seventh Circuit affirmed class certification, holding that the collective bargaining agreements' silence on benefit duration lets the retirees prove vesting through common evidence, but reversed the summary judgment they had won below, rejecting the district court's judicial-estoppel theory and returning the vesting question to the merits. (Blurb corrected 8/17: an earlier version mischaracterized the dispute as a pension-calculation challenge.)

Less is not more when drafting summary plan descriptions. Cohen & Buckmann walks through a new decision penalizing a plan for omitting important details from its SPD, and argues comprehensiveness is a fiduciary baseline rather than a drafting preference.

Multiemployer plans' aggregate funded position reached 106 percent at midyear, a recent-history high. Healthier funds change the withdrawal-liability settlement calculus on both sides of the table.

Human Resources Director's employer-facing walkthrough of the Trump Accounts proposed regulations: contribution mechanics, the nondiscrimination overlay, and what payroll teams should be scoping now.

Rosenbaum pushes back on the idea that benchmarking means hunting the lowest-cost provider: the fiduciary obligation is a documented process weighing services against fees, and the cheapest option can be the wrong answer.

A practical roundup of the coverage decision every health plan is facing: GLP-1 demand keeps climbing, the costs are reshaping budgets, and experts weigh the alternatives benefit leaders are actually considering.

Employers name high drug prices, high-cost claims, and hospital prices as their biggest affordability threats, and most say healthcare inflation is now eating directly into salary budgets. The compensation-side echo of the 10 percent trend number IFEBP put up last week.

Polsinelli confirms the en banc Fifth Circuit's August 11 ruling struck the ghost-rate, out-of-specialty, and bonus-exclusion provisions of the QPA methodology, and maps what the recalculation means for payors and plans.

Holland & Knight on a pair of same-day district court dismissals of tobacco-surcharge class actions, against Target in Minnesota and Campbell Soup in New Jersey. The Digest covered the Target ruling August 11; per H&K's account, the companion decisions share a notable post-Loper Bright thread, reasoning that DOL wellness-notice requirements beyond the statutory text are unenforceable.

ARA's plain-language walk-through of Kelly v. Altria: a participant who wanted to liquidate his 401(k) to catch a market uptick, sued when the transfers moved too slowly, and mostly lost on appeal. The practical moral for recordkeepers and plan committees.

Kantor & Kantor's litigation desk reads Kelly v. Altria from the participant side: the Fourth Circuit's holding that a recordkeeping services agreement is a plan document expands what administrators must produce on request, and what statutory penalties attach when they don't.

The Middle District of Florida dismissed most of a pro se participant's LTD underpayment claims as time-barred under the clear-repudiation rule: the limitations clock started when the underpayment was first communicated, not when payments ended. Roberts on the accrual trap that catches long-running benefit disputes.

A new complaint alleges fiduciaries selected underperforming target-date funds, and industry observers read it as a warning shot at wealth firms converging on the retirement plan arena. Fiduciary litigation following the money into the advisory consolidation wave.

The PBGC settled a Title VII promotion-discrimination claim brought by one of its own employees.

Healthcare Dive's news coverage of the TMA III ruling that led Friday's Digest: ghost rates and bonus exclusions are out of QPA math, and payouts to providers are set to rise.

The Fourth Circuit held an employee could pursue a failure-to-accommodate claim where he asked to be moved to open positions and was instead parked on unpaid leave. A reminder that leave is an accommodation of last resort, not a safe harbor.

Boutwell Fay's FAQ on the section 4960 excise tax for tax-exempt employers: who counts as a covered employee, how the $1 million threshold and parachute rules interact, and the traps for organizations with related entities.

With salary budgets flat and AI reshaping rewards, employers lean on transparency, career growth, and benefits to retain talent.