Melissa A. Winn

With the Affordable Care Act’s employer shared responsibility reporting requirements for 2015 quickly approaching, benefit advisers should already be working with employer clients to implement benefit administration systems to ensure compliance with the law, industry experts say.

Adviser help is needed to encourage employers to adopt the FSA rollover allowance, which has demonstrated growth results for employee contributions and enrollment numbers.

How Christy Schwan, one of EBA's Most Influential Women in Benefit Advising, became an integral player in the benefits business and continues to pay it forward by mentoring up-and-coming advisers at her all-female benefit firm.

Saddled with the high cost of emerging specialty drugs, employers are looking to their benefit advisers for strategies to manage their medical plan’s drug spend.

CMS says small employers and their benefit advisers in select states will have early access to the ACA’s Small Business Health Options Program to test-drive the system, but not all are interested.

The IRS has released long-awaited draft instructions for the forms employers will use to comply with the ACA’s employer mandate, giving benefit advisers and their clients a glimpse of the work ahead for 2015 and how to begin preparing now.

Fed up over unpaid enrollment commissions, benefit advisers are suing the Nevada state exchange and its website contractor Xerox.

The Department of Labor is evaluating the use of brokerage windows in 401(k) plans and is offering employers, benefit advisers, and other stakeholders an opportunity to weigh in on the subject.

Employers and employees more than ever need the help of their trusted adviser to communicate in plain language the complexities of today’s health care landscape.

Employers say in 2015 they will continue to shift toward offering CDHPs, but many need adviser help to engage employees in better health care decisions and understand the benefits of a private exchange.

Millennials, Gen Xers and single parents have different savings goals in mind that will require benefit advisers and employers hoping to increase retirement plan participation to target the needs of these differing employee populations.

Employers are increasingly adopting best practices to ensure compliant retirement plan administration — and one of those practices is using an adviser.

Benefit advisers working with small to mid-size employers to boost benefit participation can focus on cost-saving measures and enrollment and education activities that larger companies are more inclined or able to invest in.

As the part-time workforce in America expands, a growing number of employers are considering voluntary benefit packages as a recruitment and retention tool not only for full-time staff, but their variable hour employees, as well.

Withdrawal liability is a seldom understood threat that could cost some of your employer clients tens of millions of dollars. Benefit advisers hoping to soften the blow can direct employers to do three things.

United Benefit Advisors has named insurance veteran Les McPhearson its new chief executive officer. In a Q&A with EBA he talks about trends in the benefits industry and the future role of the trusted adviser.

The IRS released draft forms for employers to use to report health coverage offerings to employees, unveiling a glimpse of the administrative onus in store for benefit advisers and their employer clients working to comply with the health law.

Employees are increasingly dissatisfied with their benefits, and therefore dissatisfied with their employers, but new research shows better benefits education can help.

Benefit advisers and their employer clients are in a unique position to help the newest members of the workforce overcome investment fears and prepare for retirement.

The DOL says employers reacting to the Supreme Court’s Hobby Lobby ruling by canceling contraceptive coverage will be required to notify their employees of the change, an important administrative note for benefit advisers working with employers electing to do so.