Advisory Opinions

Whether an arrangement between Dorinco Reinsurance Company, an indirectly wholly owned subsidiary of Dow Chemical Company, and Metropolitan Life Insurance Company to jointly insure certain employee benefit plans covering employees of Dow and its affiliates is exempt from ERISA's prohibited transaction provisions by section 408(b)(5).

Regarding the application of the prohibited transaction provisions of ERISA section 406 and Internal Revenue Code section 4975 to certain proposed transactions by the Financial Institutions Retirement Fund, a multiple employer defined benefit pension plan seeking to establish and operate a for-profit plan-owned entity called Pentegra.

Whether employee benefit plans established and maintained by Albright Care Services are "church plans" within the meaning of ERISA section 3(33) and therefore exempt from coverage by ERISA section 4(b)(2).

Whether ERISA section 4(b)(3), which excludes from ERISA plans that are maintained solely to comply with state-mandated disability benefits, would apply to a disability benefits program offered by the Association of Independent Colleges and Universities in New Jersey to its members for their employees.

Whether the Miami Beach Fraternal Order of Police Insurance Trust Fund, a health and life insurance arrangement for actively employed or retired police officers of the City of Miami Beach, Florida, is a "governmental plan," as defined in ERISA section 3(32) and, thus, excluded from ERISA coverage by ERISA section 4(b)(1).

Whether Aetna Services, Inc., which provides services to its own pension plan, may receive fees from certain mutual funds which the company has selected as investment options for participants in the plan as "reimbursement" for "direct expenses" incurred within the meaning of Department regulation section 2550.408c-2(b)(3) and thus would not violate ERISA section 406(b)(3).

Request for guidance concerning the application of section 9345(a)(3) of the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1987 to the proposed implementation of a provision in the Butler Manufacturing Company's stock bonus plan permitting participants to diversify their accounts in investments other than the Company's common stock. The stock bonus plan and a defined benefit plan together make up a floor-offset arrangement established before December 17, 1987.

Whether the proposed decision by the A.T. & S.F. Employees Benefit Association to serve as a "point-of-service" provider of health care services under a managed care program sponsored by the Railroad Employees National Health Care Plan effects the status of the Association and the health benefit program the Association sponsors for its own members under ERISA.

Whether the receipt of fees by Aetna Life Insurance and Annuity Company, an indirect subsidiary of Aetna Insurance Company, Inc., from unrelated mutual funds for recordkeeping and other services in connection with investments by employee benefit plans in the unrelated funds violates ERISA section 406(b)(3).

Whether the payment of certain 12b-1 or subtransfer agent fees by a mutual fund in which an employee pension benefit plan has invested to Frost National Bank, serving as the plan's trustee, would violate ERISA sections 406(b)(1) and 406(b)(3).