Case Name: WELLS, Respondent - Cross-Appellant, v. CARLSON, dba Leisure Logging Company, Appellant - Cross-Respondent
Court: Oregon Court of Appeals
Jurisdiction: Oregon
Decision Date: 1986-04-16
Citations: 78 Or. App. 536
Docket Number: 83-1404; CA A31828
Parties: WELLS, Respondent - Cross-Appellant, v. CARLSON, dba Leisure Logging Company, Appellant - Cross-Respondent.
Judges: Before Richardson, Presiding Judge, and Joseph, Chief Judge, and Warden, Judge.
Reporter: Oregon Reports, Court of Appeals
Volume: 78
Pages: 536–543

Head Matter:
Argued and submitted February 11, 1985,
affirmed on appeal; reversed and remanded on cross-appeal April 16, 1986
WELLS, Respondent - Cross-Appellant, v. CARLSON, dba Leisure Logging Company, Appellant - Cross-Respondent.
(83-1404; CA A31828)
717 P2d 640
Thomas C. Thetford, Eugene, argued the cause for appellant - cross-respondent. With him on the briefs was Armstrong, McCullen, Percy & Philpott, P.C., Eugene.
Douglas A. Haldane, Eugene, argued the cause for respondent - cross-appellant. On the brief was Brent G. Summers, Portland.
Before Richardson, Presiding Judge, and Joseph, Chief Judge, and Warden, Judge.
WARDEN, J.
Joseph, C. J., dissenting.

Opinion:
WARDEN, J.
Defendant Carlson appeals from a judgment awarding plaintiff $928.20 as unpaid wages and $2,609.41 as attorney fees. Plaintiff cross-appeals, arguing that the trial court erred in not awarding him $4,284 as a civil penalty under ORS 652.150 for defendant's wilful failure to pay wages.
Plaintiff worked for defendant as a timber faller or "cutter" during the summer of 1982. He worked with a group of three to five other cutters which was loosely organized under the direction of a "bull buck," Mather, who acted as foreman for the employer. Each of the cutters signed a timber-cutting contract with defendant in which he is referred to as "contractor." The contract provided that a cutter would carry his own insurance and that neither party would "be held liable for the liabilities of the other party."
The cutters were to be paid on a piecework basis at $8.50 per thousand board feet. They were given draws of varying amounts at varying intervals. Sometimes the checks for the draws were delivered to individual cutters by a representative of the company and sometimes they were given to Mather, who then gave them to each cutter. No withholdings were deducted from the checks. The cutters complained about getting paid through Mather, because they thought him unreliable and did not trust him. In response to their complaints, plaintiff claims, representatives of Leisure Logging told them that they would be paid on the 10th and the 25th of each month at a draw rate of $130 a day, as the rigging crew was paid. That arrangement, which defendant denies, was never carried out.
Plaintiff and his cutting group worked on defendant's "Wilkins Way" tract, which was divided into four units. Plaintiff worked on three of them. He was paid in full for work done on the first two units, but neither he nor some of the other cutters were paid for work they performed on the third unit. Later, in the spring of 1983, plaintiff learned that one of the members of his group, Rondeau, had recently been paid by defendant for his work. Plaintiff made demands on Eads, a Leisure Logging employe, and defendant, for the amount due him for the 6-1/2 days that he had worked on the third unit. He testified that both men assured him that he would be paid, but he was not. The case was tried to the court, which found that plaintiff was an employe, that defendant owed him wages of $928.20 and that defendant did not wilfully withhold payment of those wages.
Whether a worker is an employe or an independent contractor is a question of law, if the facts are not in dispute. Lamy v. Jack Jarvis & Company, Inc., 281 Or 307, 312, 574 P2d 1107 (1978). If as in this case, there is conflicting evidence about the facts of the relationship, the resolution of the conflict is for the trier of fact. Nordling v. Johnston, 205 Or 315, 283 P2d 994, 287 P2d 420 (1955). When the facts have been decided, their legal effect is a question of law. Woody v. Waibel, 276 Or 189, 554 P2d 492 (1976). At the close of plaintiffs case, defendant moved for what he designated "a directed verdict." We treat the motion as one for a judgment of dismissal under ORCP 54B(2). The motion was denied and that is assigned as error, as is the trial court's holding that plaintiff was an employe. The court did not err in denying the motion. Castro and Castro, 51 Or App 707, 713, 626 P2d 950 (1981).
We also conclude that the trial court's legal conclusion is correct. Although there are indicia pointing to an independent contractor relationship — the contract terms, lack of withholdings and irregular pay periods — they are more form than substance. Plaintiff was paid on a piecework basis for cutting trees. Defendant paid him in part in the form of draws, which were equivalent to paychecks. There was also evidence that, although the plan was never implemented, defendant agreed to pay plaintiff and the other cutters draws figured at $130 per day on a regular basis, just as it had paid the rigging crew. Furthermore, although defendant's power to fire plaintiff was never explicitly established, a fair reading of the record is that defendant had that power.
Defendant also assigns error to the trial court's failure to grant his motion for dismissal at the close of plaintiffs case because of the insufficiency of the evidence to establish a definite sum of money due. Plaintiff pled in quantum meruit for wages "at the agreed and reasonable rate of $142.80 per day." He put on evidence that a fellow worker on the same job had been paid at that rate. He referred to Rondeau's check stub, "then determined the sum owed him by defendant by converting the scale figure contained on Rondeau's check stub into a figure based on man-days on the job." He calculated that he was owed 6-1/2 days times $142.80, or $928.20. Plaintiff argues that his testimony is substantial evidence to support the award of damages.
"Q. So you, have no idea what you cut or what was cut totally, do you?
"A. The only thing I saw was a check stub that Randy Rondeau had when he come out and told me he got paid, come by the house and told me he got paid. That's the only time I knew anybody got paid. If he hadn't told me, I wouldn't have known.

"Q. Mr. Wells, I take it you didn't keep track of actually how many trees you cut? It was just you were working together and you say just whatever the board feet that were cut, that was divided among a number of cutters?
"A. Well, in man days, if I work on a unit for six and a half days, well, then whatever the scale comes out to. And this case, it come out to 142 per man days, then I would get six and a half times the man days, the wage for the one man day. And some worked like ten days. Some worked five days. Some worked one."
He also testified that payment was to be made on the basis of $8.50 per 1,000 board feet of logs cut and that he and his partner were "averaging between 20,000 and 30,000 a day." That testimony is not controverted. It would support a finding that he earned wages of $170 to $255 per day. Although we might wish for more precise evidence of the exact amount of wages due plaintiff, the evidence that was received is sufficient to support the finding of the trial court in his favor.
The dissent implies that plaintiff cannot recover because he had pleaded a specific contract and has proved something else. We disagree, but even if plaintiff had pleaded an express contract, he would be still entitled to prove damages on a quantum meruit basis. Schroeder v. Schaefer, 258 Or 444, 464, 477 P2d 720, 483 P2d 818 (1971); see also N. Tillamook Sanitary v. Great American, 46 Or App 173, 611 P2d 319, rev den 289 Or 588 (1980).
Because plaintiffs evidence was sufficient, the trial court correctly denied defendant's motion to dismiss. We turn now to plaintiffs cross-appeal. The trial court denied plaintiffs claim for a civil penalty under ORS 652.150, because it concluded that "defendant did not wilfully withhold payment of the wages, but did so under a misunderstanding." That statement indicates that the trial judge applied the wrong legal standard. An employer wilfully fails to pay when it does so intentionally, i.e., knows what it is doing, intended to do it and is a free agent. Sabin v. Willamette-Western Corp., 276 Or 1083, 1093, 557 P2d 1344 (1976); Kling v. Exxon Corp., 74 Or App 399, 408, 703 P2d 1021 (1985); Garvin v. Timber Cutters, Inc., 61 Or App 497, 500, 658 P2d 1164 (1983). Defendant knew that plaintiff had demanded payment for the 6-1/2 days that he worked and freely chose not to pay him. That failure to pay was wilful within the meaning of ORS 652.150, and the trial court must determine how much penalty plaintiff may recover on the basis of a calculated average daily wage.
Affirmed on appeal; reversed and remanded on cross-appeal.
Service was never made on Greenland. Even though an order was made dismissing him from the case, that was unnecessary; he was never a party.
Because plaintiff had only pleaded the $142.50 figure as a reasonable daily wage, and because he did not move to amend his pleadings after the evidence came in, he could not recover more than the amount pleaded.
ORS 652.150 provides:
"If an employer wilfully fails to pay any wages or compensation of any employe who is discharged or who quits employment, as provided in ORS 652.140, then, as a penalty for such nonpayment, the wages or compensation of such employment of such employe shall continue from the date thereof at the same rate until paid or until action therefor is commenced; provided, that in no case shall such wages or compensation continue for more than 30 days; and provided further, the employer may avoid liability for the penalty by showing financial inability to pay the wages or compensation at the time they accrued."