Unitholders approved proposed changes to two of Toronto-based Manulife Asset Management Ltd.’s mutual funds at special meetings held on Thursday.

The unitholders voted to replace certain operating expenses with fixed administration fees for Manulife U.S. All Cap Equity Class (Advisor Series and Series T6) and Manulife Global Balanced Private Trust (Advisor Series, Series L, Series LT6, and Series T6) effective March 1.

They also approved to change the auditor for Manulife Tactical Income Fund to Ernst & Young LLP from PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP.

According to a statement from Manulife, the benefits of the fixed administration fee model include:

> a management expense ratio (MER) that will be substantially equal to or less than the most recently reported fund MERs;
> increased certainty and transparency of fund MERs;
> protection against an increase in MERs; and
> Manulife will assume the risk of future increases in operating expenses.