Case Name: FMC Corporation, Petitioner v. Workmen's Compensation Appeal Board (Wadatz), Respondent
Court: Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania
Jurisdiction: Pennsylvania
Decision Date: 1988-06-03
Citations: 116 Pa. Commw. 527
Docket Number: Appeal No. 2541 C.D. 1986
Parties: FMC Corporation, Petitioner v. Workmen's Compensation Appeal Board (Wadatz), Respondent.
Judges: to Judges Doyle and Barry, and Senior Judge Kalish, sitting as a panel of three. Submitted on briefs March 22, 1988, to President Judge Crumlish, Jr., and Judges Craig, MacPhail, Doyle, Barry, Colins and Palladino, sitting as the Court En Banc.
Reporter: Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court Reports
Volume: 116
Pages: 527–532

Head Matter:
542 A.2d 616
FMC Corporation, Petitioner v. Workmen's Compensation Appeal Board (Wadatz), Respondent.
Submitted on briefs November 19, 1987,
to Judges Doyle and Barry, and Senior Judge Kalish, sitting as a panel of three. Submitted on briefs March 22, 1988, to President Judge Crumlish, Jr., and Judges Craig, MacPhail, Doyle, Barry, Colins and Palladino, sitting as the Court En Banc.
Michael J. Wagner, Evey, Routch, Black, Dorezas, Magee & Andrews, for petitioner.
John W. Pollins, III, for respondent, Albert Wadatz.
June 3, 1988:

Opinion:
Opinion by
Judge MacPhail,
Petitioner, FMC Corporation, seeks review of an order of the Workmens Compensation Appeal Board (Board) which reversed and remanded the referees order and reinstituted compensation benefits for total disability for injuries separate and distinct from the specific loss of claimants, Albert Wadatz, left foot.
On November 5, 1980, claimant, who was employed by petitioner, sustained a work-related injury in which his left foot was crushed and subsequently amputated. The notice of compensation payable described the injury as a crushed left foot. Subsequently, the petitioner filed a petition for modification alleging that the claimants injury was limited to a specific loss of his left foot without any injury or disability separate and distinct therefrom, and that payments should be terminated as of February 14, 1986. There was no factual dispute over the specific loss of the left foot. All parties agreed that claimant was entitled to compensation for the amputation for a total of 275 weeks pursuant to Section 306(c), (d) of the Pennsylvania Workmens Compensation Act (Act), Act of June 2, 1915, PL. 736, as amended, 77 PS. §513.
The Boards order reversed the referees decision that claimants disability was limited to specific loss benefits and ordered compensation benefits for total disability reinstated. The Board, in addition, remanded the case for a determination of counsel fees to be awarded, noting that there was conflicting evidence in the record concerning the calculation of those fees. In its order, the Board authorized the referee, at his discretion, to reopen the record to resolve the matter if the referee should decide that that was necessary.
We now must decide whether the instant appeal should be quashed under the "no exception" rule on remand orders which we first enunciated in Murhon v. Workmen's Compensation Appeal Board, 51 Pa. Commonwealth Ct. 214, 414 A.2d 161 (1980).
In Murhon, this Court held that "a remand order of the Board [Workmens Compensation Appeal Board] is interlocutory and unappealable as a matter of right, without exception" 51 Pa. Commonwealth Ct. at 217, 414 A.2d at 163 (emphasis added, footnote omitted). Judge (later Justice) Wilkinson stated for the Court that the principal reason for our decision was the fact that over the years prior to Murhon, so many exceptions had developed to the "well established doctrine" that an interlocutory order of the Board was not appealable, that the doctrine had lost its vitality. We recently took the opportunity to affirm Murhon in Budd Trailer Co. v. Workmen's Compensation Appeal Board (Behney), 105 Pa. Commonwealth Ct. 258, 524 A.2d 525 (1987), when we held that an employers failure to appeal from a Board remand order did not bar the employer from appealing the Boards final order entered after the referee acted on remand.
Notwithstanding our strong language in Murhon, we have, since that decision, again begun to carve out exceptions to the firm rule we had therein enunciated. See, e.g., Mangine v. Workmen's Compensation Appeal Board (Consolidated Coal Co.), 87 Pa. Commonwealth Ct. 543, 487 A.2d 1040 (1985), H. B. Sproul Construction Co. v. Workmen's Compensation Appeal Board, 60 Pa. Commonwealth Ct. 413, 431 A.2d 1143 (1981) and Air Products and Chemicals, Inc. v. Workmen's Compensation Appeal Board (Koval), 109 Pa. Commonwealth Ct. 565, 531 A.2d 826 (1987).
We now feel that it is time to once again reassert and reaffirm what we said in Murhon. In doing so we expressly overrule all decisions subsequent to Murhon which noted an exception to our decision in that case.
Our reasoning in Murhon remains viable now. Appellate courts ought not to be called upon to decide a case until every issue involved has been finally resolved in the proceedings before the trial court or administrative agency. Only then will our decision put to rest the opposing claims of the litigants. By holding last to the Murhon rule, we remove all doubt for trial courts, administrative agencies and counsel for litigants as to our position With respect to the appealability of interlocutory orders. At the same time, we would be in complete compliance with Pa. R. A.P. 702(a) which authorizes appellate review of "final orders" (emphasis added).
Should counsel for a disappointed litigant feel that an order, though interlocutory on its face, involves a controlling question of law where an immediate appeal would materially advance the ultimate termination of the matter, an application may be made to the court or to the adjudicating government unit to certify that issue to us. See Section 702 of the Judicial Code, 42 Pa. C. S. §702. Should the adjudicating government agency refuse to. certify, we may review that denial.
In the case now before us, there is the possibility, if not the likelihood, that once the referee determines the counsel fee issue which has been remanded to him, yet another appeal will be taken to the Board and then to this Court. Such procedures work against the economical use of júdicial time and are at variance with what we tried to accomplish in Murhon. •
Since it is quite apparent that the order now before us is interlocutory and that there is no controlling question of law involved, we will quash the appeal and remand the case for implementation of the Boards remand order.
Order
The appeal of FMC Corporation is quashed. The case is remanded to the Workmens Compensation Appeal Board for implementation of its remand order dated July 25, 1986.
Jurisdiction is relinquished.