All opinions are subject
to modification and technical correction prior to official publication in the
North Carolina Reports and North Carolina Court of Appeals Reports. In the
event of discrepancies between the electronic version of an opinion and the
print version appearing in the North Carolina Reports and North Carolina Court
of Appeals Reports, the latest print version is to be considered authoritative.
NO.
COA06-310
NORTH
CAROLINA COURT OF APPEALS
Filed: 2
January 2007
NORMA G. HOLLIN,
Employee,
Plaintiff
v. North
Carolina Industrial Commission
I.C.
File No. 346691
JOHNSTON COUNTY COUNCIL
ON AGING,
Employer
LIBERTY MUTUAL INSURANCE
COMPANY,
Carrier,
Defendants
Appeal
by plaintiff from an opinion and award entered 14 November 2005 by the North
Carolina Industrial Commission. Heard
in the Court of Appeals 18 October 2006.
Brent
Adams & Associates, by Brenton D. Adams and Sheila W. Chavis, for
plaintiff-appellant.
Hedrick
Eatman Gardner & Kincheloe, L.L.P., by Tonya D. Davis and Bettina Mumme,
for defendant-appellees.
HUNTER,
Judge.
Norma
G. Hollin (“plaintiff”) appeals from an opinion and award of the North Carolina
Industrial Commission (“the Commission”) denying her claim for benefits
pursuant to the Workers’ Compensation Act.
Plaintiff argues that, as she was required to provide her own vehicle
for transportation as part of her employment as a health care aide with the
Johnston County Council on Aging (“defendant”), the injuries she sustained
while traveling to her worksite arose out of and in the course of
employment. We agree and therefore
reverse the opinion and award of the Commission.
Plaintiff’s
case came before the Commission on 27 June 2005. The evidence tended to show that plaintiff was employed by
defendant as a health care aide providing assistance to patients in their
homes. Plaintiff saw the same patients
each week and worked regular hours from 8:00 a.m. in the morning until 4:00
p.m. in the afternoon, Monday through Friday.
Plaintiff was required to use her own personal vehicle for
transportation to her patients’ homes, and received reimbursement for travel
between patients’ homes. However, as
part of defendant’s company policy, plaintiff was not considered to be working
or “on the clock” while traveling from her residence to her first patient’s
home in the morning and from her last patient’s home in the afternoon back to
her residence, and she did not receive reimbursement for such travel. Plaintiff earned $6.72 per hour in addition
to 31¢ for each mile she traveled between job sites.
On
20 May 2003, plaintiff was traveling to the home of her first patient for the
day when she was involved in a head-on collision with another vehicle. As a result of the accident, plaintiff
sustained severe injuries to both legs and underwent several surgeries. Plaintiff resigned from her employment with
defendant on 16 June 2003 due to the severity of her injuries and the extended
period of time she would require to recover.
After
considering the evidence, the Commission concluded that plaintiff’s injury did
not arise “in the course of” her employment and entered an opinion and award
denying her claim to benefits.
Plaintiff
appeals.
“This
Court’s review of a decision of the Full Commission is limited to determining
whether competent evidence supports the Full Commission’s findings of fact, and
whether the Full Commission’s findings of fact support its conclusions of
law.” Munoz v. Caldwell Mem’l Hosp.,
171 N.C. App. 386, 389, 614 S.E.2d 448, 451 (2005). “However, questions of law are reviewed de novo.” Nicholson v. Edwards Wood Prods., ___
N.C. App. ___, ___, 625 S.E.2d 562, 564 (2006). The question of whether a claimant’s injury arises in the course
of employment is a mixed question of law and fact. Munoz, 171 N.C. App. at 389, 614 S.E.2d at 451. Here, plaintiff does not challenge the
Commission’s findings, but rather its conclusions of law. We must therefore determine whether the
Commission’s findings support its conclusion of law that plaintiff’s injury did
not arise out of and in the course of her employment.
“An
employee is entitled to workers’ compensation benefits for injuries sustained
in an accident arising out of and in the course of employment.” Hunt v. Tender Loving Care Home Care
Agency, Inc., 153 N.C. App. 266, 269, 569 S.E.2d 675, 678
(2002). The term “arising out of”
refers to the cause of the accident, while the term “in the course of” refers
to the time, place, and circumstances in which an accident occurred. Id.
“The accident must happen during the time and at the place of
employment.” Id.
The
“going and coming rule” provides that “‘injuries sustained by an employee while
going to or from work are not ordinarily compensable’ because the injuries do
not arise out of or in the course of employment.” Munoz, 171 N.C. App. at 389, 614 S.E.2d at 451 (quoting Bass
v. Mecklenburg County, 258 N.C. 226, 231-32, 128 S.E.2d 570, 574
(1962)). This is because “‘the risk of
injury while traveling to and from work is one common to the public at large,’”
Munoz, 171 N.C. App. at 389, 614 S.E.2d at 451 (quoting Creel
v. Town of Dover, 126 N.C. App. 547, 555, 486 S.E.2d 478, 482 (1997)),
and “[a]n employee is not engaged in the business of the employer while driving
his or her personal vehicle to the place of work or while leaving the place of
employment to go home.” Hunt,
153 N.C. App. at 269, 569 S.E.2d at 678.
However, the going and coming rule is subject to the following exceptions:
“(1) an employee is
going to or coming from work but is on the employer’s premises when the
accident occurs (premises exception); (2) the employee is acting in the course
of his employment and in the performance of some duty, errand, or mission thereto
(special errands exception); (3) an employee has no definite time and place of
employment, requiring her to make a journey to perform a service on behalf of
the employer (traveling salesman exception); or (4) an employer contractually
provides transportation or allowances to cover the cost of transportation
(contractual duty exception).”
Munoz, 171 N.C. App. at 390,
614 S.E.2d at 451 (quoting Stanley v. Burns Int’l Sec. Servs., 161 N.C.
App. 722, 725, 589 S.E.2d 176, 178 (2003) (citations omitted)).
In
the instant case, the Commission rejected plaintiff’s arguments that two
exceptions to the going and coming rule apply to her case: the “traveling salesman” exception and the
“contractual duty” exception. The
“traveling salesman” exception states that “[i]f travel is contemplated as part
of the employment, an injury from an accident during travel is
compensable.” Hunt, 153 N.C.
App. at 269, 569 S.E.2d at 678. Such
claims are compensable because “employees with no definite time and place of
employment . . . are within the course of their employment when
making a journey to perform a service on behalf of their employer.” Creel, 126 N.C. App. at 556-57, 486
S.E.2d at 483. The applicability of
the “traveling salesman” exception to a
particular case “‘depends upon the determination of whether [the] plaintiff had
fixed job hours and a fixed job location.’”
Munoz, 171 N.C. App. at 390, 614 S.E.2d at 451 (quoting Hunt,
153 N.C. App. at 270, 569 S.E.2d at 678).
Applying
the traveling salesman exception to the instant case, the Commission found that
plaintiff “worked from 8:00 a.m. in the morning until 4:00 p.m. in the
afternoon, Monday through Friday.”
Although plaintiff worked with patients in their individual homes,
plaintiff worked with the same patients each week. The Commission also found that “[p]laintiff would see these same
patients until the patient died, got sick, or no longer needed her
services.” Based on these findings, the
Commission concluded that:
Because plaintiff had
fixed work hours and saw the same patients each week, her situation is
different from a true traveling salesman who might visit a different customer
each day. Plaintiff saw the same
patients week after week, traveled to the same homes week after week, and
therefore she had fixed work locations.
Therefore, the traveling salesman exception does not apply to this case.
The
findings of fact support the Commission’s determination that the traveling
salesman exception does not apply to the instant case. See Hunt, 153 N.C. App. at 269-70, 569
S.E.2d at 678-79.
We
also agree with the Commission that the “contractual duty” exception does not
apply to plaintiff’s claim. “The
‘contractual duty’ exception provides that where an employer provides
transportation or allowances to cover the cost of transportation, injuries
occurring while going to or returning from work are compensable.” Id. at 270, 569 S.E.2d at 679. “Where the cost of transporting employees to
and from work is made an incident to the contract of employment, compensation
benefits have been allowed.” Id. Although plaintiff was reimbursed for travel
as part of her job, plaintiff admitted that she was not reimbursed for travel
to the first patient’s home in the morning and from the last patient’s home to
her home in the afternoon. Plaintiff
understood and agreed to this policy at the time she was hired by
defendant. Plaintiff was injured as she
was traveling to her first patient’s home.
The Commission concluded that “[p]laintiff was only paid travel
reimbursement for travel between patients’ homes and defendant-employer did not
transport any employees to and from work.
Therefore, the contractual duty exception does not apply in this
case.” The Commission’s conclusions are
supported by its findings.
We
nevertheless agree with plaintiff that her claim was compensable. Plaintiff was required as a condition of
employment to use her personal vehicle while at work. “If the employee as part of his or her job is required to bring
along his or her own car, truck or motorcycle for use during the working day,
the trip to and from work is by that fact alone embraced within the course of
employment.” 1 Arthur Larson, Larson’s
Workers’ Compensation Law §15.05(1) (2006). Professor Larson notes that the reasoning
behind the rule
is in part related to
that of the employer-conveyance cases:
the obligations of the job reach out beyond the premises, make the
vehicle a mandatory part of the employment environment, and compel the employee
to submit to the hazards associated with private motor travel, which otherwise
he or she would have the option of avoiding.
But in addition there is at work the factor of making the journey part
of the job, since it is a service to the employer to convey to the premises a
major piece of equipment devoted to the employer’s purposes. . . .
Id. at §15.05(2).
This
rule is followed in a great number of jurisdictions. See, e.g., Olsten Kimberly Quality Care v.
Pettey, 944 S.W.2d 524, 527 (Ark. 1997); Smith v. Workmen’s Compensation
Appeals Board, 447 P.2d 365, 373 (Cal. 1968); Whale Communications v.
Osborn, 759 P.2d 848, 848 (Colo. Ct. App. 1988); Poinciana Village
Const. Corp. v. Gallarano, 424 So. 2d 822, 823 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 1982); Pittsburgh
Testing Laboratories v. Kiel, 167 N.E.2d 604, 606-07 (Ind. App. 1960); Medical
Assoc. Clinic v. First Nat. Bank, 440 N.W.2d 374, 375-76 (Iowa 1989); Prothro
v. Louisiana Paving Co., Inc., 399 So. 2d 1229, 1230 (La. App. 1981); Alitalia
v. Tornillo, 603 A.2d 1335, 1343 (Md. 1992); Gilbert v. Star
Tribune/Cowles Media, 480 N.W.2d 114, 115 (Minn. 1992); White v.
Atlantic City Press, 313 A.2d 197, 200 (N.J. 1973); Weatherbee Electric
Company
v.
Duke,
294 P.2d 298, 301 (Okla. 1955); Liberty Northwest Ins. Corp. v. Over,
810 P.2d 876, 877-78 (Or. App. 1991); Toolin v. Aquidneck Island Med.
Resource, 668 A.2d 639, 641 (R.I. 1995); Bailey v. Utah State Industrial
Commission, 398 P.2d 545, 547 (Utah 1965).
For
example, in a case strikingly similar to the present one, the Supreme Court of
Arkansas held that an in-home nurse’s assistant who was injured on her way to
the home of her first patient of the day was entitled to workers’ compensation
benefits. Olsten Kimberly Quality
Care, 944 S.W.2d at 527. The
claimant used her own vehicle for travel to and from her patients’ homes, but
received no wages for travel time, and was not reimbursed for travel
expenses. Id. at 525. The Olsten Court noted that the
“‘going and coming’ rule ordinarily precludes recovery for an injury sustained
while the employee is going to or returning from his place of employment.” Id. at 527. It was nevertheless
evident that [the
claimant] was required by the very nature of her job description to submit
herself to the hazards of day-to-day travel in her own vehicle, back and forth
to the homes of her patients. As such,
[the claimant] was acting within the course of her employment with
[defendant-employer] at the time her injuries were sustained.
Id. The Court reasoned: “‘It is . . . clear that delivering nursing
services to patients at their homes is the raison d’etre of the
[employer’s] business, and that traveling to patients’ homes is an essential
component of that service.’” Id.
(citation omitted).
Defendant
argues that this Court’s decision in Franklin v. Board of Education, 29
N.C. App. 491, 224 S.E.2d 657 (1976), prevents adoption of a rule providing
compensation benefits where an employee is required to furnish their own
conveyance and is injured on the way to the worksite. In Franklin, the claimant’s decedent was a teacher
employed at two schools located several miles apart. Id. at 492, 224 S.E.2d at 658. She received traveling expenses to drive her personal vehicle
between the two. Id. She was killed in an automobile accident
when she backed her car out of the school parking lot and onto the
highway. The point of impact was on the
highway. Id. at 493, 224 S.E.2d
at 659. The day she was killed, she had
finished teaching at one school, and had driven to the other school to pick up
her paycheck. She was killed after
picking up her paycheck. Id. The Commission concluded that the decedent’s
death did not arise out of and in the course of her employment and denied
benefits. Id. at 494, 224 S.E.2d
at 660. Upon appeal, this Court agreed
with the Commission, as there was no evidence to show that the decedent was on
employer-related business when she was killed.
Id. at 495, 224 S.E.2d at 660.
The Court never addressed the issue, however, of whether the claimant
should be entitled to compensation because she was required to furnish her own
vehicle, and it is unclear whether such a claim was ever raised before the
Court. As such, we do not agree that Franklin
operates to bar plaintiff’s claim.
Defendant
further argues that adoption of the rule would eliminate the contractual duty
exception. We do not agree. This rule will expand, not eliminate the
contractual duty exception. As
Professor Larson cautions,
care must be exercised
not to confuse these cases with the more common cases [involving contractual
duty exceptions] in which attention is focused exclusively on the journey
itself -- in particular, on the question:
was the employee paid for the time or expenses of the journey
itself? In the present category, it is
immaterial whether the employee is compensated for the time or expenses of the
journey, since work-connection is independently established by the fact of
conveying the vehicle to the operating premises. Indeed, it is quite common in these cases to find that the
employee is reimbursed for his or her mileage after he or she reaches the
premises and until he or she leaves for home, but specifically not for the
going and coming trip. Yet the going
and coming trip has repeatedly been held covered in these circumstances.
Larson
at §15.05(2) (footnote omitted).
It
is well established in North Carolina that the Workers’ Compensation Act should
be liberally construed and that “‘[w]here any reasonable relationship to
employment exists, or employment is a contributory cause, the court is
justified in upholding the award as “arising out of employment.”‘” Kiger v. Service Co., 260 N.C. 760,
762, 133 S.E.2d 702, 704 (1963) (quoting Allred v. Allred-Gardner, Inc.,
253 N.C. 554, 557, 117 S.E.2d 476, 479 (1960)). We find the reasoning of Olsten Kimberly Quality Care and
the many jurisdictions that follow the rule expressed in Larson’s highly
persuasive, and we hold that where an employee who is required to furnish their
own vehicle as part of their employment is injured going to or coming from
work, such injuries are covered by the Workers’ Compensation Act. See Kiger, 260 N.C. at 762, 133
S.E.2d at 704. Plaintiff here was
required to furnish her own vehicle for her employer’s use in providing in-home
care to patients. “‘[D]elivering nursing
services to patients at their homes is the raison d’etre of
[defendant’s] business, and . . .
traveling to patients’ homes is an essential component of that
service.’” Olsten Kimberly Quality
Care, 944 S.W.2d at 527 (citation omitted). Plaintiff was traveling to her first patient’s home at the time she
sustained her injuries. She was
required to travel there in her own vehicle, and so was “required by the very
nature of her job description to submit herself to the hazards of day-to-day
travel . . . back and forth to the homes of her patients.” Id. Unlike the public at large, who may choose their mode of
transportation, plaintiff was required to use her private vehicle as part of
her employment. “As such, [plaintiff]
was acting within the course of her employment with [defendant] at the time her
injuries were sustained.” Id.
In
conclusion, we hold plaintiff is entitled to benefits under the Workers’
Compensation Act. We therefore reverse
the opinion and award denying plaintiff benefits and remand this case to the
Commission for entry of an opinion and award consistent with this opinion.
Reversed
and remanded.
Judges
HUDSON and CALABRIA concur.
Judge
HUDSON concurred in this opinion prior to 31 December 2006.