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The Department of Labor is giving the financial services industry and consumer advocates more time to comment on its controversial fiduciary conflict-of-interest rule proposal.

If employees are not well prepared for retirement it should be a major concern for both employees and their employers, experts say.

Commentary: At the end of an unsuccessful enrollment campaign, an adviser may wonder why participation was so low after they spent time and money on communications. It’s simple, says David Melton: Brokers employing the same old strategy will not succeed.

Reporting requirements under the Affordable Care Act call for high levels of coordination between payroll and HR departments. One of the biggest changes this year is the employer shared responsibility provisions that went into effect for many large employers. Correct payroll data is vital to the end-of-year reporting process and in assessing whether an employer is subject to the provisions. Mike Trabold, director of compliance risk at Paychex, shares five best practices to ensure accuracy and help reduce the likelihood of penalties.

Only 10% of some 480 employers in 36 industries responding to a recent poll have implemented an in-house or outsourced solution to comply with Affordable Care Act reporting requirements.

Does giving employees multiple choices of health plans drive competition and empower them pick plans offering the greatest value and highest quality care –the theory underlying the Affordable Care Act and many employers’ benefit plan designs?

Whether participating in private exchanges or not, some say similar programs have been in place for decades, pointing to the government’s 50-year-old Federal Employee Health Benefit Plan as early example of what many employers are dealing with today.

Whatever employers have spent to comply with the Affordable Care Act so far, some feel the costliest years are yet to come.

Just over one year ago, President Obama signed a Presidential Memorandum directing the Secretary of Labor to “restore the common sense principles” related to overtime.

The head of a Senate investigative subcommittee said he plans to look into problems with the health insurance marketplaces set up for the Affordable Care Act that forced many taxpayers to owe some of the tax credit money they had received for buying health insurance.