IBM Retirees Get Labor Department Support in Pension Math Appeal

An appeal over how IBM Corp. calculates pension benefits drew the attention of the Labor Department, which filed a brief saying aspects of the case were wrongly dismissed as untimely.

The lengthy pension estimates IBM sends to its workers aren’t enough to trigger the clock on their deadline to sue for fiduciary breach under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, the department told the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in an Aug. 23 friend-of-the-court brief. The three-year deadline to bring fiduciary breach claims under ERISA begin to run when workers have “actual knowledge” of the facts ...