DOL Fiduciary Proposal Threatens Small-Biz Retirement Plans: U.S. Chamber

He added that "it's not clear yet how significant a problem" purchasing "fiduciary insurance" will be. "Advisors will have to buy an insurance policy that they haven't even purchased before."

Campbell explained to ThinkAdvisor that a small plan "hiring an advisor has no choice—the advisor to a small plan must be an ERISA fiduciary under the proposal. If the small plan advisor is not currently an ERISA fiduciary, it would have to rearrange its business model to ensure level compensation or it would have to comply with the requirements of an applicable exemption from the [DOL's] prohibited transaction rules." Either approach, he continued, "likely requires significant expense and change. This includes buying fiduciary insurance—advisors who are not currently fiduciaries generally are not covered for fiduciary activity under their standard Errors and Omissions policies."

By contrast, a large plan hiring an advisor "retains choice," in that the advisor "to a large plan is not required to make these changes under the [DOL] proposal. By disclosing certain information and upon acknowledgment by the large plan (the details depend on whether the large plan is more than 100 participants or more than $100 million in assets) the large plan advisor does not have to become a fiduciary, avoiding the additional requirements."

While "DOL perceives this as additional protection for small plans—the Chamber report perceives it as bias against small employers that eliminates choice and increases costs."

Campbell also noted the problems with DOL's Best Interest Contract Exemption. While DOL has stated that the best interest contract exemption within its plan "will preserve [advisors'] traditional compensation and therefore minimize problems," Campbell said, "the reality is [that] advisors … would still have to make very significant changes to their compensation structure" under such an exemption.Changing their compensation structure along with the "tremendous amount of disclosure requirements" under BICE and the fiduciary insurance requirement amount to "quite a significant change," he said.

Alice Joe, managing director for the Chamber's Center for Capital Markets Competitiveness, noted on the call that Chamber is hearing from its plan sponsor members that the impact of DOL's proposal will be felt most "on the financials and how advisors will have to change their business models."

She said the Chamber is working on its comment letter to DOL and "sorting through" the plan's prohibited transaction exemptions, including BICE. "We have heard from our members that the exemptions are not workable, [and that] BICE would completely turn their business models on its head."

That being said, however, "DOL has indicated significant interest in hearing from the industry as they truly want to make this thing work," Joe continued. Chamber is "optimistic there will be changes to make this rule better."

Robert Reynolds, CEO of Great-West Financial and Putnam Investments, noted during a speech at the SPARK conference the same day the "potentially damaging impact on costs and investors' access to advice" from DOL's fiduciary redraft. "What we need," he said, "is strong enforcement of existing law — real accountability and consequences — not more red tape. That's the ideal way to serve savers' best interests — and drive bad actors out of retirement services."

— Related on ThinkAdvisor:

• DOL Fiduciary Redraft Would Kill Many Small-Biz Retirement Plans: Survey
• DOL Fiduciary Survey 'Bogus,' Advocate Warns Lawmakers