Title: Fendler v. Hudson Servs.
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: SC92177
State: Missouri
Issuer: Missouri Supreme Court
Date: July 3, 2012

SUPREME COURT OF MISSOURI 
en banc 
 
 
CAROL FENDLER, 
 
 
 
) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
 
Appellant, 
 
 
 
 
) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
vs. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
No. SC92177 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
HUDSON SERVICES, AND 
 
 
) 
DIVISION OF EMPLOYMENT 
 
) 
SECURITY,  
 
 
 
 
) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
 
Respondents. 
 
Appeal from the Labor and Industrial Relations Commission 
 
Opinion issued July 3, 2012 
 
 
The Labor and Industrial Relations Commission denied the appellant, Carol 
Fendler, unemployment benefits after it found that she engaged in willful misconduct by 
repeatedly and deliberately disregarding her supervisor’s instructions.  Ms. Fendler 
appealed, arguing that the commission erred in finding that she engaged in misconduct 
because although she may have acted negligently she did not deliberately violate her 
supervisor’s instructions.  This Court affirms.  
 Section 288.030.1(23)1 provides that an employee engages in misconduct if she 
deliberately violates her employer’s reasonable instructions or rules or if she repeatedly 
acts with a degree of negligence that manifests a substantial disregard for her employer’s 
                                             
 
1 All statutory references are to RSMo 2000 unless otherwise noted. 
interests or of her duties and obligations to the employer.  Here, competent and 
substantial evidence supported the commission’s finding that Ms. Fendler willfully failed 
to follow her supervisor’s instructions, although able to do so, on 11 separate occasions 
after her supervisor warned her three times that she needed to comply with the 
instructions.  Affirmed.   
I. 
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND 
 
 
Hudson Services provides property management services, including commercial 
cleaning and security.  Ms. Fendler was hired by Hudson in 1994, and by 2008 she had 
become an operations assistant in the housekeeping department.  Hudson’s janitorial 
employees use an automated telephone system to clock in and out of work.  The resulting 
information is used to determine payroll. 
One of Ms. Fendler’s duties was to verify the hours of employees who failed to 
use the telephone system for a particular work shift.  Hudson had no written policy as to 
how she was to undertake the verification.  Until July 2008, her supervisor authorized her 
to do so by calling employees and entering the total hours the employees said they 
worked.  Beginning in July 2008, Ms. Fendler was placed under a new supervisor, Pam 
Meister, who instructed her that entry of the total hours worked no longer would be 
sufficient.  Ms. Fendler instead was directed to record the specific times that employees 
who failed to use the telephone system said they started and ended work.  Ms. Meister 
also informed Ms. Fendler that if she wanted to enter only the total number of hours an 
employee worked, she needed to obtain approval from the general manager. 
During 2009, Ms. Meister gave Ms. Fendler warnings on two occasions when Ms. 
Fendler failed to comply with the new procedure.  On December 28, 2009, Ms. Meister 
gave Ms. Fendler a third warning when the latter again failed to comply with the required 
verification procedure.  Nevertheless, during January 2010, Ms. Fendler failed to enter 
the exact time employees clocked in and out on 11 separate occasions.  On January 25, 
2010, Hudson fired Ms. Fendler.   
 
Ms. Fendler filed a claim for unemployment benefits.  On March 3, 2010, the 
division of employment security denied Ms. Fendler benefits because it found that she 
was discharged for misconduct.2  Ms. Fendler appealed to the appeals tribunal, which 
held a hearing at which both Ms. Fendler and Ms. Meister testified.3  Ms. Fendler 
testified that she always called employees to verify when they started and stopped work 
but that she simply failed to enter the exact times into the payroll system.  She admitted 
that Ms. Meister told her to input employees’ actual clock-in and clock-out times into the 
payroll system and said she did not do so because she was used to not having to do it 
under her previous supervisor.  She denied that she received a third warning on 
December 28, 2009.  She did not claim she did not know how to comply with              
Ms. Meister’s instructions but instead explained that she did not know that her failure to 
                                             
 
2 “If a deputy finds that a claimant has been discharged for misconduct connected with 
the claimant’s work, such claimant shall be disqualified for waiting week credit and 
benefits ….”  § 288.050.2. 
3 Hudson’s owner, William Hudson, reiterated in his testimony that Ms. Fendler was 
required to enter the actual start and end times of employees who failed to use the 
telephone system and that she was required to ask for approval from the general manager 
if she wished simply to enter the total number of hours employees worked. 
 
3
follow the instructions would jeopardize her employment and that she would have 
complied with the instructions had she known she would be fired for non-compliance.   
Ms. Meister testified that she instructed Ms. Fendler to enter the exact times that 
employees began and ended their work shifts and to get approval from the general 
manager before simply entering the total hours an employee worked.  Ms. Meister also 
testified that she warned Ms. Fendler three times, including on December 28, 2009, that 
she needed to comply with these instructions.  Finally, Ms. Meister stated that because 
Ms. Fendler did not enter the exact times that employees clocked in and out, she believed 
Ms. Fendler was not calling employees to verify the hours they actually worked.   
The appeals tribunal reversed the deputy’s finding of misconduct.  Hudson 
appealed to the commission, which found that Ms. Meister’s testimony was more credible 
and concluded that Hudson had met its burden of showing that Ms. Fendler had engaged 
in misconduct, stating: 
Claimant was in charge of checking employer’s payroll and reconciling 
discrepancies in employees’ reported hours.  Claimant’s supervisor, Ms. 
Meister, instructed her to list clock-in and clock-out times on employer’s 
payroll program.  Claimant consistently failed to comply with this directive.  
Ms. Meister gave claimant three chances to correct her behavior.  Claimant 
was formally warned by Ms. Meister on December 28, 2009, to verify 
hours.  After that warning, claimant failed on eleven occasions to list clock-
in and clock-out times for employees.  Claimant’s repeated failure to 
comply with explicit instructions takes her conduct outside the realm of 
mere mistakes or poor work performance and into the realm of 
insubordination.  See Freeman v. Gary Glass & Mirror, LLC, 276 S.W.3d 
388, 393 (Mo. App. 2009) (holding that claimant’s “repeated failure to 
follow the Employer’s specific directions” amounts to misconduct 
connected with work). 
 
 
4
(emphasis added).  Ms. Fendler appealed.  Following a decision by the Missouri Court of 
Appeals, this Court granted transfer.  Mo. Const. art. V, § 10.       
II. 
STANDARD OF REVIEW AND BURDEN OF PROOF 
 
Article V, section 18 of the Missouri Constitution provides for judicial review of 
the commission’s decisions to determine whether they “are supported by competent and 
substantial evidence upon the whole record.”  Mo. Const. art. V, § 18.  Under section 
288.210: 
The findings of the commission as to the facts, if supported by competent 
and substantial evidence and in the absence of fraud, shall be conclusive, 
and the jurisdiction of the appellate court shall be confined to questions of 
law. The court, on appeal, may modify, reverse, remand for rehearing, or 
set aside the decision of the commission on the following grounds and no 
other:  
 
(1) That the commission acted without or in excess of its powers;  
(2) That the decision was procured by fraud;  
(3) That the facts found by the commission do not support the award; or  
(4) That there was no sufficient competent evidence in the record to warrant 
the making of the award. An appeal shall not act as a supersedeas or stay 
unless the commission shall so order. 
 
§ 288.210.  “Whether the award is supported by competent and substantial evidence is 
judged by examining the evidence in the context of the whole record.”  Hampton v. Big 
Boy Steel Erection, 121 S.W.3d 220, 223 (Mo. banc 2003).  “This Court defers to the 
Commission on issues involving the credibility of witnesses and the weight given to 
testimony,” Johnson v. Denton Const. Co., 911 S.W.2d 286, 288 (Mo. banc 1995), but in 
so doing it does not view “the evidence and all reasonable inferences drawn therefrom in 
the light most favorable to the award.” Hampton, 121 S.W.3d at 223.  This Court reviews 
questions of law de novo, and “Whether the Commission’s findings support the 
 
5
conclusion that a claimant engaged in misconduct connected with his or her work is a 
question of law.”  Tenge v. Washington Grp. Int’l, Inc., 333 S.W.3d 492, 496 (Mo. App. 
2011); accord Ahearn v. Lewis Café, Inc., 308 S.W.3d 294, 297 (Mo. App. 2010).  
“In general, a claimant bears the burden of demonstrating that [she] is entitled to 
unemployment benefits; however, when the employer claims that the applicant was 
discharged for misconduct, the burden shifts to the employer to prove misconduct 
connected to work.”  Rush v. Kimco Corp., 338 S.W.3d 407, 411 (Mo. App. 2011); accord 
Hoover v. Cmty. Blood Ctr., 153 S.W.3d 9, 13 (Mo. App. 2005).  As a result, Hudson had 
the burden of proving by a preponderance of the evidence that Ms. Fendler was fired for 
misconduct.  Hoover, 153 S.W.3d at 13; Ahearn, 308 S.W.3d at 297.  
III. 
THE 
COMMISSION’S 
DETERMINATION 
THAT 
MS. 
FENDLER 
DELIBERATELY VIOLATED HER SUPERVISOR’S INSTRUCTIONS WAS 
SUPPORTED BY COMPETENT AND SUBSTANTIAL EVIDENCE 
 
 
 
 
The purpose of unemployment benefits is to provide financial assistance to people 
who are unemployed through no fault of their own.  See § 288.020.1.4  As a result, 
unemployment benefits are restricted if an employee is fired for misconduct.  See            
§ 288.050.2.  Section 288.030.1(23), RSMo Supp. 2005, defines “misconduct” as:  
                                             
 
4 Section 288.020 states in relevant part: 
As a guide to the interpretation and application of this law, the public 
policy of this state is declared to be as follows: Economic insecurity due to 
unemployment is a serious menace to health, morals, and welfare of the 
people of this state resulting in a public calamity. The legislature, therefore, 
declares that in its considered judgment the public good and the general 
welfare of the citizens of this state require the enactment of this measure, 
under the police powers of the state, for compulsory setting aside of 
unemployment reserves to be used for the benefit of persons unemployed 
through no fault of their own.  (emphasis added). 
 
6
[A]n act of wanton or willful disregard of the employer’s interest, a 
deliberate violation of the employer’s rules, a disregard of standards of 
behavior which the employer has the right to expect of his or her employee, 
or negligence in such degree or recurrence as to manifest culpability, 
wrongful intent or evil design, or show an intentional and substantial 
disregard of the employer’s interest or of the employee’s duties and 
obligations to the employer. 
 
Ms. Fendler claims that the record supports only a finding that she acted 
negligently, not willfully.  Therefore, she argues, the commission erred in finding that she 
engaged in misconduct because negligence cannot support a finding of misconduct.  Her 
argument fails for two reasons. 
First, even had the record not supported the commission’s finding that               
Ms. Fendler’s conduct was willful, that would not preclude a finding of misconduct.  
Although Ms. Fendler is right that simple negligence cannot support a finding of 
misconduct, Yellow Freight Sys. v. Thomas, 987 S.W.2d 1, 4 (Mo. App. 1998), section 
288.030 defines “misconduct” to include not just a willful violation of the employer’s 
rules but also “negligence in such degree or recurrence as to manifest culpability, 
wrongful intent or evil design, or show an intentional and substantial disregard of the 
employer’s interest or of the employee’s duties and obligations to the employer.”             
§ 288.030.  Therefore, an employee may engage in misconduct under the statute by 
repeatedly choosing to act in what amounts to reckless disregard of the employer’s rules 
or of the employee’s duties or obligations.  See, e.g., Rush, 338 S.W.3d at 411-12 (“there 
is a degree of negligence that [section 288.030] explicitly recognizes as ‘misconduct’”) 
(emphasis in original); Spain v. R & L Carriers Shared Serv., 361 S.W.3d 433, 440 (Mo. 
App. 2011), quoting § 288.030 (“Under [section 288.030], misconduct may be established 
 
7
where there is ‘negligence in such degree or recurrence as to manifest culpability, … or 
show an intentional and substantial disregard of the employer’s interest or of the 
employee’s duties and obligations to the employer’”) (alteration in original).  
Second, the record as a whole supports the commission’s conclusion that           
Ms. Fendler’s “repeated failure to comply with explicit instructions takes her conduct 
outside the realm of mere mistakes or poor work performance and into the realm of 
insubordination.”  And, as the commission found, an employee’s repeated violation of a 
known, understood and reasonable work rule, in and of itself, can provide competent and 
substantial evidence that the employee willfully or deliberately violated the rule.    
Freeman v. Gary Glass & Mirror, LLC, 276 S.W.3d 388 (Mo. App. 2009), 
provides a good example.  After performing satisfactorily for three and one-half years, 
the employee’s performance declined abruptly.  Id. at 389.  He was fired after he 
recommended a product to a customer after being told not to do so, improperly installed 
doors on two separate occasions, turned away a job the company could have performed 
and failed to double check the measurements of a mirror as instructed by his supervisor.  
Id. at 389-90.  Freeman found that competent and substantial evidence supported the 
commission’s conclusion that the employee deliberately violated his employer’s 
instructions, stating “repeated failure to follow the Employer’s specific instructions, 
without any explanation, after demonstrating his ability to do so over a long period of 
time, speaks just as loudly about the willfulness of Claimant’s actions as [does a] … 
verbal refusal [to follow instructions].”  Id. at 393; accord Hurlbut v. Labor and Indus. 
 
8
Relations Comm’n, 761 S.W.2d 282, 285 (Mo. App. 1988).5 
Similarly, in Moore v. Swisher Mower and Mach. Co., Inc., 49 S.W.3d 731 (Mo. 
App. 2001), an employee who was arrested for assault and held in jail for three days 
failed to contact his employer to explain his absence.  Id. at 734.  He was fired not 
because of the arrest but because his failure to call his employer violated an absentee 
policy requiring employees to call in each day if they were going to be absent.  Id. at 738.  
He claimed the commission erred in denying his claim for unemployment benefits in that 
his failure to call his employer was simply bad judgment.  Id. at 738-40.  The appeals 
court affirmed, holding that the fact that he knew about his employer’s absentee policy 
and could have complied with it but chose not to do so on three consecutive days justified 
the finding of misconduct.  Id.  
Here, the facts supporting the judgment are stronger than those found sufficient to 
show willful disregard of an employer’s instructions or rules in Freeman and Moore.   
Ms. Fendler violated her employer’s instructions on at least 11 different occasions after 
receiving a third and formal warning not to do so again.  Further, she admitted that she 
knew Ms. Meister wanted her to enter exact start and end times; she knew how to do so 
and would have done so if she knew her job was in jeopardy.  This shows that her failure 
to follow Ms. Meister’s instructions was not the result of negligence or poor judgment 
but a deliberate choice to disregard the instructions.   
                                             
 
5 Ms. Fendler’s suggestion that she had to tell her supervisor directly that she was 
choosing to disobey the supervisor’s directions in order to be found to have willfully 
violated a work rule or engaged in insubordination is without merit.  See, e.g., Freeman v. 
 
9
 
10
                                                                                                                                                 
Ms. Fendler implies that she was entitled to a warning that she would be fired if 
she continued to disregard Ms. Meister’s instructions, but the evidence shows that she 
was aware that the procedure was being used to verify hours so that accurate payroll 
records could be produced, and that is not a minor matter that she had no reason to think 
was important.  In any event, she cites no precedent holding that an employee is entitled 
to a warning that she will be fired if she intentionally violates a reasonable work rule, and 
the cases cited above do not impose such a requirement.   
The facts adduced in the proceedings provide competent and substantial evidence 
to support the commission’s conclusion that Ms. Fendler engaged in misconduct by 
repeatedly and deliberately violating a reasonable, known and understood work rule.  
IV. 
CONCLUSION 
For the foregoing reasons the commission’s determination that Ms. Fendler was 
fired for misconduct is affirmed. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
_________________________________  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
     LAURA DENVIR STITH, JUDGE 
 
Russell, Breckenridge, Fischer and Price, JJ.,  
and Byrn, Sp.J., concur; Teitelman, C.J., dissents  
in separate opinion filed. Draper, J., not participating. 
 
Gary Glass & Mirror, LLC, 276 S.W.3d 388, 393 (Mo. App. 2009); Hurlbut v. Labor and 
Indus. Relations Comm’n, 761 S.W.2d 282, 285 (Mo. App. 1988).   
 
SUPREME COURT OF MISSOURI 
en banc 
 
 
CAROL FENDLER, 
 
 
 
) 
  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
 
Appellant, 
 
 
 
 
) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
vs. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
No. SC92177 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
HUDSON SERVICES, AND 
 
 
) 
DIVISION OF EMPLOYMENT 
 
) 
SECURITY,  
 
 
 
 
) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
 
Respondents.  
 
Dissenting Opinion 
 
 
I respectfully dissent.  The evidence in this case establishes that Ms. 
Fendler was warned three times that she needed to enter specific start and end 
times for each employee.  The evidence also shows that Ms. Fendler failed 
repeatedly to follow her supervisor’s instructions to verify payroll by entering 
specific start and end times for each employee.  However, the evidence fails to 
show that Ms. Fendler’s actions constituted a deliberate disregard of her 
employer’s interests so as to qualify as “misconduct” disqualifying her from 
receiving unemployment benefits.  
 
As the principal opinion notes, the determination of whether an employee 
engaged in misconduct is a question of law.  Appellate courts are not bound by the 
commission’s conclusions of law or its application of the law to the facts.  
Korkutovic v. Gamel Co., 284 S.W.3d 653, 656 (Mo. App. 2009).  Moreover, this 
Court’s review of whether the record establishes misconduct must be guided by 
the legislature’s mandate that the unemployment security law “shall be liberally 
construed to accomplish its purpose to promote employment security … by 
providing compensation to individuals in respect to their unemployment.”  Section 
288.020.2.   This means that “[d]isqualifying provisions are construed strictly 
against the disallowance of benefits.”  St. John's Mercy Health System v. Div. of 
Employment Sec., 273 S.W.3d 510, 514 (Mo. banc 2009).   
 
In this case, a strict construction of the term “misconduct” leads to the 
conclusion that the commission erred in denying Ms. Fendler unemployment 
compensation benefits.  Although it is undisputed that Ms. Fendler failed to 
execute her employer’s directive to verify payroll by entering specific start and 
end times for each employee, it is also true that there is no evidence directly 
supporting a finding that Ms. Fendler’s conduct was willful as opposed to 
negligent.  Instead, the conclusion that Ms. Fendler engaged in willful misconduct 
is really an inference drawn from the fact that Ms. Fendler failed repeatedly to 
verify payroll according to her supervisor’s instructions.  “While the violation of 
an employer's reasonable work rule can constitute misconduct, Moore v. Swisher 
Mower & Machine Co., Inc., 49 S.W.3d 731, 740 (Mo. App. 2001), there is a ‘vast 
distinction’ between conduct that would justify an employer in terminating an 
employee and conduct that is misconduct for purposes of denying unemployment 
 
2
 
3
benefits, Pemiscot County Memorial Hospital v. Missouri Labor and Industrial 
Relations Commission, 897 S.W.2d 222, 226 (Mo. App. 1995).”  Williams v. 
Enterprise Rent-A-Car Shared Servs., LLC, 297 S.W.3d 139, 144 (Mo. App. 
2009).   Consequently, Ms. Fendler’s failure to follow her supervisor’s instructions 
does not necessarily provide a basis for disqualifying her from receiving 
unemployment benefits.  See, e.g., Duncan v. Accent Marketing, LLC, 328 S.W.3d 
488 (Mo. App. 2010)(failure to follow repeated warnings did not establish 
misconduct); Frisella v. Deuster Elec. Inc., 269 S.W.3d 895, 899 (Mo. App. 
2008)(failure to follow employer’s instructions did not constitute evidence of 
willful misconduct).   
 
  
Instead of drawing a disputed inference in favor of the employer, I would 
apply the rule of strict construction required by section 228.020.2 and hold that the 
facts of this case demonstrate that Ms. Fendler was negligent and that the 
commission erred in concluding that she engaged in willful misconduct that 
disqualified her from receiving unemployment compensation benefits.   
  
The commission’s decision should be reversed.   
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
_________________________________  
 
 
 
 
 
 
Richard B. Teitelman, Chief Justice