By: WISCONSIN LAW JOURNAL STAFF//December 1, 2014//
U.S. Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit
Civil
Employment – MPPAA — withdrawal liability
Where an employer who withdrew from a multiemployer pension plan did not notify the AAA of its request for arbitration, the request is invalid.
“If Allega had sent a timely demand to the AAA, together with a check for $650, and the AAA had refused to proceed with arbitration, then we might have to decide whether an amendment of the fee schedule requires the PBGC’s approval. But that’s not what happened. And because Allega did not make a timely demand for arbitration, questions about venue and legal fees never arose. They could have been reviewed by the district court on a petition to review an arbitrator’s final decision; any dispute about the AAA’s fees could have been reviewed the same way. But Allega did not take the essential first step: a timely demand for arbitration sent to the AAA.”
Affirmed.
14-2512 Central States, Southeast & Southwest Areas Pension Fund v. Allega Concrete Corp.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Tharp, J., Easterbrook, J.