#10: Employer Mandate Delayed. In one of our favorite blogposts ever, Treasury announced a one-year delay of the Affordable Care Act's (ACA's) employer mandate in July 2013 (and you could almost hear the collective "phew!") (see Legal Update, Obama Administration Announces Delay of Employer Mandate Until 2015 and Employer Mandate Toolkit).

#9: SPD Terms. In 2011's Cigna v. Amara, the Supreme Court held that participants in ERISA plans cannot enforce misleading or incorrect provisions in a plan's SPD as a contractual claim for benefits under ERISA (see Article, Expert Q&A on the Impact of CIGNA Corp. v. Amara and SPD Compliance Chart for ERISA Plans).

#8: Determination Letters. In June 2016, the IRS issued Revenue Procedure 2016-37, which provides new determination letter processes and remedial amendment periods for individually designed qualified retirement plans and changed the six-year remedial amendment cycle system for pre-approved qualified retirement plans (see Legal Update, IRS Provides Determination Letter Guidance in Revenue Procedure 2016-37).

#7: Section 457 Proposed Regulations. In June 2016, the Treasury and IRS proposed rules under Section 457, which are reflected in our executive compensation for tax-exempt organizations resource (see Legal Update, IRS Proposes Rules Under Section 457 for Deferred Compensation Arrangements Maintained by Tax Exempt Organizations and Practice Note, Executive Compensation for Tax-Exempt Organizations).

#6: Same-Sex Marriage Permitted. The Supreme Court's two major same-sex marriage rulings, Windsor (2013) and Obergefell (2015), resulted in significant tax and related implications in the benefit space (see Legal Updates, Supreme Court: DOMA Section 3 is Unconstitutional and Supreme Court's Recognition of Same-Sex Marriage Raises Benefits and Employment Law Issues; Same-Sex Marriage Developments for Retirement Plans Toolkit; Practice Note, Domestic Partner Health Benefits; and Article, Expert Q&A on Same-Sex Partner Benefits After the US Supreme Court's Obergefell Decision).

#5: Dodd-Frank Developments. In recent years, the SEC has taken steps toward implementing the rulemaking provisions of the Dodd-Frank Act, including, adopting final rules on listing standards for compensation committees (see Legal Update, SEC Adopts Rules Under Dodd-Frank on Listing Standards for Compensation Committees), proposing rules to implement Dodd-Frank's clawback requirement (see Legal Update, SEC Proposes Rules Requiring Companies to Adopt Executive Compensation Clawback Policies), and adopting a final rule implementing the Dodd-Frank Act's pay ratio disclosure requirement (see Legal Update, SEC Adopts Final Dodd-Frank Pay Ratio Disclosure Rules). For more information, see Practice Note, Overview, Summary of the Dodd-Frank Act: Executive Compensation.

#4: HIPAA Omnibus Regulations. We didn't plan to spend much of 2013 focusing on HIPAA compliance, but that was the effect after HHS issued its final "omnibus" HIPAA regulations in January 2013 (see Legal Update, Final HIPAA Regulations Change Breach Notification Rules and HIPAA Privacy, Security, and Breach Notification Toolkit).

#3: Section 409A Proposed Regulations. In 2016, we updated our Section 409A resources after the Treasury and IRS proposed long-awaited rules on June 21, 2016 which, among other things, clarified and modified the 2007 final Section 409A regulations (see Legal Update, IRS Proposes Rules Clarifying and Modifying Section 409A Final Regulations and Withdrawing and Replacing a Provision of the Proposed Income Inclusion Regulations and Section 409A Toolkit).

#2: Fiduciary Rule. In April 2016, the DOL issued a final rule replacing the existing regulatory interpretation of fiduciary investment advice under ERISA Section 3(21)(A)(ii), along with several new prohibited transaction exemptions (PTEs) and amendments to existing PTEs currently used throughout the financial industry for certain investments made by ERISA plans (see Practice Notes, Definition of Fiduciary Investment Advice, Best Interest Contract Prohibited Transaction Exemption and Principal Transactions Exemption Under ERISA).

#1: ACA Individual Mandate Upheld. It's not often that the entire nation is on the edge of their seats because of a benefits-related issue, but that's how it felt moments before the Supreme Court announced its first major ACA decision, upholding the individual mandate, in June 2012 (see Legal Update, Supreme Court Upholds the ACA's Individual Mandate and Affordable Care Act (ACA) Toolkit).