Background:  On August 20, 2019, a Ninth Circuit panel in Dorman v. Schwab, No. 18-15281, reversed the district court’s denial of Schwab’s motion

to compel arbitration and held that Schwab could force the plaintiff to individually arbitrate his fiduciary duty claims challenging the administration of Schwab’s 401(k) plan.  In 2017, plaintiff Michael Dorman filed a putative class action in federal court alleging that Schwab had breached its fiduciary duties under ERISA by adding allegedly poorly performing in-house investment funds to its 401(k) plan investment lineup.  In 2015 – two years before the lawsuit was filed – Schwab had amended its 401(k) plan document to include an arbitration clause stating that “[a]ny claim, dispute, or breach arising out of or in any way related to the Plan” had to be resolved by individual, rather than class or collective, arbitration.  Based on this 2015 plan amendment, Schwab filed a motion in the district court to compel individual arbitration.  The district court denied the motion because it concluded that the plan’s arbitration provision was unenforceable with respect to the plaintiff’s fiduciary duty claims.Continue Reading Mandatory Arbitration: The Next Frontier for ERISA Retirement Plans?