Opinion ID: 1687516
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: APCo's Status as a Sister Company of the Employer

Text: The third certified question is [w]hether a corporation-owner of a plant, which relinquishes operating control to a sister company ... wholly owned by the same parent corporation ... is a `group' of [an] `employer' ..., where the corporation-owner indirectly pays the employee's wages and workers' compensation benefits. [2] We answer this third question in the negative. APCo and Southern Nuclear are both subsidiaries under the corporate umbrella of The Southern Company. In December 1991, APCo and Southern Nuclear entered into an agreement providing that Southern Nuclear would operate APCo's Farley Nuclear Plant and that APCo would be entitled to all power generated at the plant. Southern Nuclear charges APCo for its costs in operating the facility. Those costs would include the wages and benefits Southern Nuclear pays its employees. It bears emphasis, however, that these two companies are wholly separate in their operations and as legal entities. For example, APCo is an Alabama corporation in the business of selling electrical power, while Southern Nuclear is a separate Delaware corporation in the business of operating nuclear power plants. Simply stated, the conclusion is inescapable that, irrespective of the fact that Southern Nuclear charges APCo for its costs of operation, the relationship of these separate companies cannot reasonably be construed so as to make APCo a group of Southern Nuclear. Also, to answer the last certified question, we conclude that our answer to the third question is not altered by the existence of a contract between APCo and Southern Nuclear wherein they essentially agree that APCo will be deemed to be an employer for purposes of workers' compensation immunity. In this regard, we are not persuaded by APCo's arguments that we should impose the terms of this agreement on a person not a party to the agreement (and not employed by APCo), so as to render APCo immune from that person's work-related claims. Accordingly, we answer the last question in the negative. QUESTIONS ANSWERED. HOOPER, C.J., and MADDOX, ALMON, SHORES, KENNEDY, and BUTTS, JJ., concur. HOUSTON, J., concurs in part and dissents in part. COOK, J., dissents.