As an ERISA attorney who drafts plan documents at a flat fee, my biggest competitors are not other ERISA attorneys, but third-party administration (TPA) firms.
Plan documents are just another service that TPAs can provide and they can provide it either for free (as most of the bundled providers do) or at a cost that is highly competitive against most law firms. Some TPA firms have a legal department that drafts these plans, others have paralegals or plan administrators handle that duty. I know a thing or two about this topic, having done that as the Director of ERISA Legal Service for a certain TPA for almost 5 years.
As you know, retirement plans are legal entities and plan documents are legal documents that have legal consequences to the plan sponsor and the plan trustees. Would you want these plan documents to be drafted by someone who wasn’t an attorney? Even if your TPA has a legal department, there is no attorney-client relationship between the TPA’s attorney and the plan sponsor. So what? With an attorney-client relationship, the plan sponsor’s needs come first. With a TPA attorney, the TPA’s needs come first because a TPA attorney doesn’t have that duty of care. The independent ERISA attorney is essentially a check on the TPA, to ensure proper administration. A TPA attorney can’t do that because they are the TPA.
I have a client who has had their defined benefit plan butchered by two consecutive actuarial firms. An independent ERISA attorney could have alleviated some of the problems before they happened, namely paying someone a lump sum even though the law prohibited that person from getting a lump sum.
Attorneys don’t have a sterling reputation when it comes to reasonable fees, especially ERISA attorneys. With a low overhead and a flat fee, I am trying my best to make needed ERISA legal work affordable to plan sponsors.
