Previewing New Data on the Department of Labor’s ESOP Investigations

Every year, some number of ESOPs are investigated by the Department of Labor. These investigations are an ongoing concern for the ESOP community, but until now there has been no data available to answer key questions about what the risk of an investigation really means for companies— such as what issues ESOPs are most commonly investigated for, how often an investigation results in a monetary recovery by the DOL, or how much money is involved. The NCEO filed a Freedom of Information Act request to the DOL in 2013 in an attempt to shed light on these questions