Required Disclosures for Welfare Benefit Plans Other Than Group Health Plans
Overview Required Disclosures for Welfare Benefit Plans Other Than Group Health Plans
ERISA requires plan administrators to give participants in writing the most important facts they need to know about their welfare benefit plans, including plan rules, financial information, and documents on the operation and management of the plan. One of the most important documents participants are entitled to receive automatically when becoming a participant of an ERISA-covered health benefit plan is a summary of the plan, called the summary plan description or SPD. If a plan is changed, participants must be informed, either through a revised SPD, or in a separate document, called a summary of material modifications.
In This Section
Who Must Comply
The disclosure requirements in this section apply generally to welfare benefit plans, other than group health plans. An employee welfare benefit plan is a plan, fund or program established or maintained by an employer or employee organization (or both) to provide participants and their beneficiaries, through the purchase of insurance or otherwise, with certain benefits including:
- Benefits in the event of sickness, accident, disability, death or unemployment, or vacation benefits,
- Apprenticeship or other training programs, or
- Day care centers, scholarship funds or prepaid legal services.
Separation benefits, such as severance pay arrangements, may also qualify as welfare benefit plans under ERISA...