Foot Locker employees seeking to have a retirement plan reformed had an ally in court when the Department of Labor filed a brief in support of a district court's decision that the company should reform its plan.

Foot Locker converted its traditional pension plan to a cash balance plan, but, according to a suit before the 2nd Court of Appeals, Geoffrey Osberg said that the company put out false and misleading summary plan descriptions that "violated ERISA by intentionally misrepresenting to plan participants that their retirement benefits would continue to increase after the conversion."

In fact, the opposite was true, according to the brief, which said, "the conversion, in fact, was designed to and actually did cause many participants, including Osberg, to experience a sometimes-lengthy period during which participants temporarily stopped accruing benefits."

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