Last year, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its ruling in US Airways, Inc. v. McCutchen, holding that while equitable doctrines cannot “trump” the terms of an ERISA plan, they can be used to interpret, construe and fill gaps in language where plan terms are ambiguous. The important corollary to that rule, as noted in the McCutchen opinion, is that courts are not permitted to rewrite the terms of an ERISA plan when they are clear, plain and unambiguous.

To date, there has been no notable analysis of McCutchen in a court of appeals opinion. A handful of district court cases, however, have analyzed McCutchen and demonstrate how clear and unambiguous plan terms can successfully avoid the unintended application of equitable doctrines to plan terms.

McCutchen involved a self-funded health plan. The plan's terms allowed it to recover health benefits paid to a participant when that participant recovered from third-party sources, such as a tortfeasor or other insurer. Specifically, the plan stated, “[y]ou will be required to reimburse [US Airways] for amounts paid for claims out of any monies recovered from [the] third party.”