Employers are begging for information on compliance with the Affordable Care Act, and as their benefit adviser you can and should offer them guidance — or risk losing them to an adviser who will. Attorney Peter Marathas of Proskauer Rose LLP has outlined four ACA issues you should already be discussing with your clients.

Lawmakers in Maryland and Wisconsin are working to make retirement plans more readily available to private sector employees. Their efforts follow recently enacted California legislation that requires employers to contribute 3% of a worker’s salary to a retirement account.

Increasing the U.S. minimum wage may lift some workers out of poverty while leading to as many as 1 million job losses, according to a report from the Congressional Budget Office.

If the last few years were an age of reform, then we’ve definitely entered a new era — a time of compliance.

Republicans were trying to dismantle the ACA’s risk corridor premium stabilization program as recently as this week but several factors, possibly including the insurance industry itself, took them off course.

This week started out with the much anticipated employer responsibility ruling and first shocked us with the additional employer mandate delay. But there’s much more to the ruling that advisers and plan sponsors need to be aware of in the coming months.

Commentary: There are murky new ACA liabilities for your benefit agency. Craig Davidson shares how these potential liabilities lie with insurance protection coverage that you may need.

The employer coverage mandate and other ACA requirements relevant to employer sponsors of health and welfare plans will be discussed in detail as part of the “ACA Update — What Went Right, What Went Wrong — And What Now?” presentation at the Workplace Benefits Renaissance on Feb. 24, 2014.

Only time will tell if the president’s self-declared year of the executive order will solicit more action from Congress on legislation. But what are the immediate implications for employees who heard his State of the Union call for a minimum wage increase?

A long-fought battle to ease the burden of insurance brokers’ licensing procedures moved a step closer to reality on Thursday afternoon. Still, hurdles remain for NARAB, with passage in the House uncertain, and the White House scrutinizing some components of the language.

The legislation meant to cut through the red tape of state-by-state insurance broker licensing is stalled in the Senate as a standalone bill, but has been attached to another bill up for vote soon.

Among benefits-related cases in 2013, courts addressed offerings to same-sex couples, statute of limitations, remedies under ERISA and 401(k) plan fees. Here’s a look at five cases that could have implications for your benefit plans in the year ahead.

The court agreed with the plaintiff’s contention that while a church-affiliated entity may “maintain” an ERISA-exempt church plan, only plans established directly by a church or convention of churches qualify as church plans.

The case at issue is Rochow v. Life Ins. Co. of N. America. His estate sued for a denial of long-term disability benefits as well as profits allegedly made on the benefits.

The guidance in Notice 2013-74 relates to the expansion of such rollovers under the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012, which settled the expiring tax breaks as part of the fiscal cliff deal around the New Year.

As with other components of the ACA, Congress may have overlooked that ERISA already has something to say about what employees can be charged as a contribution.

Contributing Editor Ed Bray looks ahead to 2014 and outlines 25 areas to watch. In part 1: Everything from analyzing health data to HIPAA compliance and beyond.

With the ACA requiring even more communications to employees, many employers might consider shifting to electronic means for all disclosure notices, but there are many rules here and employers and their advisers should be careful.

Republican senators introduced a bill this week that would prevent the exclusion of multi-employer health plans from a $63 reinsurance fee that the ACA imposes on each enrollee.

Flexible spending account advocates expect most employers to embrace rollover provision.