Agencies launch SECURE 2.0 reporting and disclosure review 

February 14, 2024

A new triagency request for information (RFI) seeks stakeholder input on the effectiveness of existing reporting and disclosure requirements for retirement plans under ERISA and the Internal Revenue Code (IRC). Section 319 of the SECURE 2.0 Act of 2022 (Div. T of Pub. L. No. 117-328) charges the Treasury Department, Department of Labor (DOL), and Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. (PBGC) with reviewing these requirements and providing findings and recommendations to Congress by Dec. 29, 2025. Comments on the RFI are due by April 22.

SECURE 2.0 directs the agencies to review the effectiveness of their reporting and disclosure requirements for retirement plans. The act instructs the agencies to consult with a “balanced group” of participant and employer representatives and make a report to Congress.

For assessing the effectiveness of current disclosures, the agencies’ report to Congress must include an analysis of how participants provide contact information, how plans are providing disclosures to participants, and “the rate at which participants and beneficiaries are receiving, accessing, understanding, and retaining disclosures.” The agencies also must make recommendations to Congress about how current reporting and disclosure requirements might be consolidated, simplified, standardized, and improved. The RFI explains that the ultimate goals of this review are to reduce compliance burdens and improve participants’ timely receipt and understanding of information they can use to monitor their plans, prepare for retirement, and obtain their benefits.

The RFI’s two dozen questions ask stakeholders for input on aspects of current disclosure and reporting requirements for retirement plans — excluding items in DOL’s August 2023 RFI, which sought feedback on 10 other SECURE 2.0 provisions under the agency’s jurisdiction. These questions encompass the ERISA and IRC reporting and disclosure requirements for retirement plans. The agencies explain that in their view, “disclosure” refers to plans providing information to participants and beneficiaries, while “reporting” refers to plans providing information to the agencies.

The agencies say that a disclosure’s effectiveness can be evaluated from the perspective of both the participants receiving the information and the plans providing it. To that end, the RFI asks questions to gauge how participants receive and comprehend required notices, along with questions on how to improve the process of furnishing these disclosures.

• Receipt and comprehension. The RFI asks how different factors affect participants’ comprehension of disclosures and where opportunities for improvement might exist. The agencies specifically ask for assessments of how the effectiveness of disclosures correlates with their number and timing; their content, length, and complexity; and their readability for native and nonnative English speakers. The agencies also want information about when and how participants access and retain disclosures, and what (if any) steps plans take in response to participants’ lack of engagement.

• Furnishing required disclosures. The agencies want to understand the perspective of plans, plan administrators, and service providers responsible for preparing and delivering participant disclosures. The RFI includes questions on how plans obtain participants’ contact information and use electronic delivery methods to furnish disclosures (including any observable trends in participants’ receipt and opt-out rates). The agencies are interested in comments on how much providing disclosures cost, whether model agency notices reduce those costs and whether additional models would be helpful (including in languages other than English). The RFI also asks for suggestions on how to reduce these costs without diminishing the disclosures’ effectiveness.

Commenters are asked to give their insights into the reporting process and the usefulness of the reported information. Regulators are considering not only plans’ perspectives but also those of the agencies receiving the reports, participants and beneficiaries of reporting plans, and third parties that may rely on reported information for study or participant advocacy.

• Submission of reports. The RFI asks for comments on the frequency, timing and content of required reports. The agencies question whether instructions should be subject to a readability standard (similar to the one that applies to participant disclosures), whether filing methods are efficient and whether filers receive adequate customer service support. The RFI also looks for information on how much reporting costs and whether some reports are more expensive than others.

• Use of publicly available information. The agencies want to know if any of the information already provided to them might also be useful for participants and, if so, could be provided to them in a cost-effective manner. The RFI also includes questions on the reports’ usefulness for other entities like the public, data aggregators and participant advocates, including how to manage confidentiality and security concerns relating to public release of the information.

Although the RFI is expansive, it excludes certain reporting requirements.

• Form 5500 series omitted. The agencies urge commenters to focus on information and analyses beyond the Form 5500 annual reporting series. While acknowledging that Form 5500 is a key component of retirement plan reporting, the agencies believe they already have a sufficient process for soliciting feedback as part of their annual review of the form. (When finalizing SECURE 2.0-related reporting changes last year, DOL indicated that the agencies expect to propose a broader Form 5500 modernization project in the near future to make investment and other information more data-mineable.)

• Enforcement activity and other exclusions. Information provided in the context of an audit, examination, investigation or enforcement action is outside the RFI’s scope, as is information that plan officials voluntarily furnish to obtain favorable treatment (for instance, as part of a submission under IRS’s Employee Plans Compliance Resolution System or DOL’s Voluntary Fiduciary Correction Program). The RFI also excludes any submission to the agencies that isn’t specific to retirement plans, such as reporting on foreign investment holdings.

In addition to a general request for additional information that might be helpful toward achieving SECURE 2.0’s directive, the agencies ask whether participants and plans might benefit from increased interagency coordination — for instance, by harmonizing specific disclosures or reports. The RFI also asks what other ways the agencies might collect data that would be helpful in preparing the report to Congress.

The agencies expect to leverage other sources of information beyond the RFI to fulfill the act’s directives. These resources may include responses to DOL’s 2019 RFI on the effectiveness of ERISA retirement plan disclosures — released with the agency’s 2019 electronic disclosure proposal — and PBGC’s 2017 RFI on improving reporting requirements. The agencies may also consider recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) reports, ERISA Advisory Council reports from 2017 and 2013, and IRS Advisory Council recommendations.

• RFI on SECURE 2.0 Section 319 (Federal Register, Jan. 23, 2024)
• Div. T of Pub. L. No. 117-328, the SECURE 2.0 Act of 2022 (Congress, Dec. 29, 2022)

• User's guide to SECURE 2.0 (updated regularly)
• DOL starts tackling SECURE 2.0 reporting and disclosure updates (Sept. 19, 2023)
• Form 5500 trilogy concludes with latest set of changes (March 13, 2023)
• DOL proposes new electronic delivery rule for retirement plan notices (Nov. 1, 2019)