Eleventh Circuit Overturns Administrative-Exhaustion Requirement for Statutory ERISA Claims

For 40 years, the Eleventh Circuit required plan participants to exhaust a plan’s internal claims procedures before bringing statutory claims under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) in federal court, including claims for breach of fiduciary duty.

That has now changed. On October 13, 2026, the Eleventh Circuit ruled en banc in Bolton v. Inland Fresh Seafood Corp. of America, Inc.¹ that participants are no longer required to exhaust administrative remedies before bringing statutory ERISA claims. The decision does not change what ERISA requires of fiduciaries or the substantive remedies available to participants, and participants still must exhaust a plan’s internal claims procedures before asserting a claim for denied benefits. But by removing a hurdle that plaintiffs — and plaintiffs’ firms — have long faced, the decision raises the risk of ERISA litigation against plan fiduciaries in Georgia, Florida, and Alabama.

Background and the Decision

The now-discarded rule originated in Mason v. Continental Group, Inc.² In Mason, former employees of a manufacturing plant sued after the plant closed, alleging that their employer closed the plant to avoid its pension obligations. They brought various ERISA claims, including a claim that the company fired them to interfere with their pension rights in violation of Section 510 of ERISA, and related claims that the company breached its fiduciary duties and disclosure obligations under ERISA.

The employer sought dismissal because the employees had skipped the pension plan’s internal appeals procedure. The Eleventh Circuit agreed. It acknowledged that ERISA’s civil enforcement provisions under 29 U.S.C. § 1132(a) are “silent with regard to whether exhaustion is to be required” for statutory claims but imposed the requirement anyway, citing “[c]ompelling considerations”: Administrative procedures reduce frivolous lawsuits, lower the cost of dispute resolution, prevent “premature judicial intervention,” and give courts the benefit of trustees’ considered decisions if a dispute is litigated.

Over the four decades since Mason, courts in the Eleventh Circuit have applied this administrative-exhaustion requirement to a wide range of statutory ERISA claims, including claims for breach of fiduciary duties under Section 404 and retaliation claims under Section 510. Plan participants who brought ERISA claims in district courts in Georgia, Florida, and Alabama without first exhausting administrative remedies faced dismissal, or at least a stay of litigation until they did.

Bolton ends that era. It involved an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) sponsored by Inland Fresh Seafood. In 2016, the ESOP took out a $92 million loan and used the proceeds to buy Inland Fresh Seafood stock from four of the company’s officers and directors. Without first using the plan’s internal claims procedure, former employees sued the company, the plan’s trustee and committee, and several officers and directors on behalf of the plan and a proposed class of plan participants. They brought fiduciary-breach claims under Section 502(a)(2) and (a)(3) of ERISA, alleging that the defendants violated their duties of prudence and loyalty under Section 404 and engaged in prohibited transactions under Section 406 by causing the plan to pay tens of millions of dollars more than the stock was worth.

The district court dismissed the case under Mason, noting that although the Eleventh Circuit “may be unique” in requiring exhaustion, that “does not justify ignoring” its administrative-exhaustion requirement. A panel of the Eleventh Circuit affirmed, but two of its three judges wrote separately urging the full court to overrule Mason. The court then reheard the case en banc, with the U.S. Secretary of Labor filing an amicus brief supporting the participants.

The Eleventh Circuit unanimously held in its en banc decision that ERISA “does not require administrative exhaustion of statutory claims, including breach of fiduciary duty claims,” explicitly overruling Mason and its progeny “to the extent they hold that ERISA itself requires exhaustion of statutory claims.” The court reasoned that ERISA contains no exhaustion requirement for statutory claims, and that Mason’s rule “was an atextual product of judicial creation based solely on policy reasons.” Citing Supreme Court precedent, the court added that judges overstep their role when they impose exhaustion rules that ERISA’s text does not require. Finally, the court declined the defendants’ request to apply the new rule prospectively only, reversed the dismissal, and remanded for further proceedings.

Key Takeaways

Following Bolton, participants can take statutory ERISA claims straight to federal court — and plan sponsors face greater litigation risk as a result.

A key area where Bolton might especially increase litigation exposure is ERISA excessive-fee litigation. These class action cases, which involve ERISA fiduciary claims alleging that defined-contribution plan investments underperformed or charged excessive fees, have grown substantially over the past decade, with 2025 among the busiest years on record. Fewer have been filed in the Eleventh Circuit than elsewhere, due in part to its exhaustion requirement. With that hurdle gone, ERISA class action filings in district courts within the Eleventh Circuit may increase.

As a result, plan sponsors and fiduciaries with a presence in Georgia, Florida, or Alabama should consider the following:

1. Continue to have a good fiduciary process. Bolton is a procedural change that opens the courthouse doors wider, but it does not change the substantive standards by which fiduciary conduct is judged. A documented, prudent process remains the key defense to fiduciary claims. Plan fiduciaries should continue to follow — and document — a sound process for weighing which investment options to select or retain in defined-contribution plans and for evaluating plan fees.
2. Watch for employee solicitations and Section 104(b) document requests. ERISA class action complaints often draw on publicly available plan information, such as Form 5500 data, and on outreach to current or former participants through mailers, social media, and other online advertising. Human resources and benefits staff should know that such outreach may signal that a plan is being reviewed for potential claims. Additionally, ERISA Section 104(b)(4) requires a plan administrator to furnish the plan document and certain other documents in response to a participant’s written request. These requests — whether sent by a participant or by counsel on the participant’s behalf — often precede litigation. Plan administrators should ensure that such requests are promptly routed to counsel and timely answered, as an administrator that fails to respond within 30 days may face statutory penalties under ERISA.
3. Keep an eye on the Supreme Court. On October 6, 2026, the Supreme Court of the United States heard argument in Anderson v. Intel Corp. Investment Policy Committee, which concerns the pleading standard for ERISA fiduciary-duty claims based on alleged fund underperformance. The Justices appeared receptive to the fiduciaries’ position at argument, and may give lower courts more guidance on screening out meritless ERISA claims at the pleading stage. Such a ruling, expected by the end of the 2026–27 Term, would guide district courts in the Eleventh Circuit and nationwide.
4. Remember that denial-of-benefit claims still require exhaustion. Bolton explicitly left intact the Eleventh Circuit’s long-standing precedent requiring participants to exhaust a plan’s administrative claims procedures before suing for benefits under the terms of a plan governed by ERISA — a requirement that the court has described as “no longer open to serious dispute,” and that other federal courts nationwide also apply. The difference is that a benefits claim enforces the plan’s own terms, which the plan’s claims procedures are designed to resolve, whereas the statutory claims at issue in Bolton enforce duties that ERISA itself imposes. Plan sponsors will therefore continue to benefit from carefully administering their claims procedures in accordance with plan terms and ERISA’s requirements. Those procedures remain a prerequisite to suing for benefits, and the administrative record they generate remains central to how courts review such claims.
5. Review plan language on exhaustion. Bolton also did not address whether a plan can contractually require exhaustion of statutory claims. It held only that this plan did not: Its terms said that a participant “need not file a claim” and “may” seek review. Plan sponsors should review their plan documents and summary plan descriptions to see whether their claims procedures are mandatory or optional, and whether they apply to statutory ERISA claims. Sponsors should not assume, however, that adding mandatory exhaustion language will restore the exhaustion defense for statutory claims, as that remains an open question.

Bolton removes a procedural defense that was unique to the Eleventh Circuit. It does not alter the substantive standards that govern plan fiduciary conduct, or the tools that fiduciaries have long used to defeat meritless claims at the pleading stage and beyond. Plan sponsors and fiduciaries with a presence in Georgia, Florida, or Alabama should nonetheless use the decision as an opportunity to confirm that their fiduciary processes are sound and well documented, and that early signs of potential litigation are promptly routed to counsel.

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