Laura Cooley Retirement Plan Advisor View Bio

The Department of Labor (DOL) fiduciary rule has been widely covered over the past couple of years, spurring a debate of whether or not investors and plan sponsors will be better served and protected from biased investment advice. A recent article on entrepreneur.com talks about who is responsible for the best interest of a company’s employees retirments plans, the company or their advisor?

A fiduciary is someone who is acting in the best interest of their clients by making prudent and impartial recommendations. What many plan sponsors don’t realize is that they are considered fiduciaries to the plan, even though they rely on the expertise and advice of others, whether that is a financial advisor, service provider, ERISA attorney or third-party advisor.

Responsibility From The DOL Rule

The DOL fiduciary rule doesn’t change plan sponsor responsibilities, it affects financial advisors and their fiduciary standard of care. Despite your expectation, not all financial advisors are fiduciaries. If you are not sure whether your advisor acts as a fiduciary or not, you need to ask.

At Lawley Retirement Advisors, we act as 3(21) co-fiduciary and have always consulted with clients on fees, investment selection, plan governance and plan design. The important word here is co-fiduciary. We partner with plan sponsors to better the plan and its participants.

The importance of sharing the attached article is that it emphasizes the involvement of the plan sponsor. The author of the article writes: “When sponsors don’t pay adequate attention to the fees assessed by the administrators and the menu of investment options chosen by those administrators, the plan participants’ retirement savings can take a hit over the long-term.”

We are very diligent about reviewing and benchmarking plan fees and service providers for our clients. We facilitate and monitor the process; that is a service we provide to our clients, but we always review the findings and recommendations with plan sponsors so they clearly understand why the decision was to remain where we are or make a change.

I disagree with one piece of this article– that “small business owners can’t afford this luxury”. The size of the business is not a deterrent. They may lack expertise at first, but if they work with a financial advisor who is committed to educating them and filling in the gaps like we prefer to do at Lawley, their knowledge of plan governance will grow.

Securities offered through Cadaret, Grant & Co., Inc. Member FINRA/SIPC. Advisory services offered through Lawley Retirement Advisors, LLC, an SEC Registered Investment Advisor. Lawley Retirement Advisors, LLC and Cadaret, Grant & Co., Inc. are separate entities.

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