Opinion ID: 1254146
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: loaned-servant principle

Text: 4. Defendant asserts that the trial court erred in denying certain requested instructions with reference to the loaned-servant principle. It contends that from the evidence presented a jury would be justified in finding that Pete Amundson was a loaned servant of the O'Hara Fuel & Transfer Company at the time in question and that, therefore, it was error for the trial court to instruct the jury as a matter of law that Amundson's negligence, if any, would be imputed to the defendant railroad company. This court has adopted the right of control or direction test for determination of an employee's status as a loaned servant. Nepstad v. Lambert, 235 Minn. 1, 50 N.W. (2d) 614, 36 Minn. L. Rev. 290; St. Paul-Mercury Ind. Co. v. St. Joseph's Hospital, 212 Minn. 558, 4 N.W. (2d) 637; Roe v. Winston, 86 Minn. 77, 90 N.W. 122; Wicklund v. North Star Timber Co. 205 Minn. 595, 287 N.W. 7. Such right of control or direction should not be found merely because an employer has the right to direct the end result of the work, but the crucial factor is the right to direct the manner and mode of performing the work. Antonelly v. Adam, 175 Minn. 438, 221 N.W. 716; Chapman v. Peoples Ice Co. 125 Minn. 168, 145 N.W. 1073. In view of the duel control concept, whereby an employee may have a general and special employer, and the laudable policy of imposing liability on that employer most able to prevent occurrence of the injury, this court has construed the loaned-servant principle as demanding that the special employer shall have the right to exercise detailed authoritative control over another's servant before liability will shift from the general employer to the special employer under the doctrine of respondeat superior. Nepstad v. Lambert, supra . [13] The source of the employee's wages and the right of discharge should be considered as elements of such control, but they are not necessarily conclusive. Nepstad v. Lambert, supra ; Boll v. C.S. Brackett Co. 134 Minn. 268, 158 N.W. 609, 159 N.W. 1095; Roe v. Winston, supra . The facts of the instant case actually come directly under the anticipatory dictum in Nepstad v. Lambert, where we said (235 Minn. 14, 50 N.W. [2d] 622):    Detailed authoritative control must be distinguished from mere designation of work or suggestions made incident to encouraging cooperation between related activities on large projects. Defendant, however, claims that the following facts show that plaintiff as an O'Hara employee had a right of control over Amundson consonant with the test set forth in the Nepstad case. The O'Hara company or its employees determined (1) the order of loading articles of freight into the truck, (2) the number of articles to be loaded into the truck, (3) where articles were to be placed in the truck, (4) when trucks would pick up the items of freight, and (5) how many trips would be made each day. However, do these facts show that plaintiff or the O'Hara company employees exercised or had the right to exercise detailed authoritative control over Amundson's method and manner of performing his work? Such directions regarding the order of loading, number, and location of articles in the truck merely pertain to the end result of the work and do not affect the method and manner of performing the initial work of actually moving freight from the warehouse onto the delivery trucks. The record establishes that Amundson used the two-wheel hand truck without instruction from plaintiff. He also directed plaintiff's action in tipping the crate onto the bed of the hand truck, and plaintiff and other O'Hara employees testified that as a general practice defendant's warehouse employees told them what to do when moving freight. Furthermore, the O'Hara company neither paid Amundson nor had any power to discharge him. At most the evidence discloses that a co-operative relationship existed between defendant's warehouse employees and the O'Hara company and not detailed authoritative control as required by the Nepstad case. Defendant argues that regardless of the lack of evidence of actual control, Amundson could have been found to be a loaned servant of the O'Hara company in view of the provisions of the hauling contract and this court's classification of actual control as mere evidence of the right of control in the Nepstad case. [14] It seems clear that the O'Hara company occupied the status of an independent contractor since the hauling contract itself states: (a)    All hauling and unloading of such freight shall be done by the Contractor at the Contractor's sole expense.