Opinion ID: 3044846
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Unemployment Benefits

Text: Following her termination on November 4, 2011, Green filed for unemployment compensation benefits but was deemed ineligible on the grounds that she was terminated for misconduct. Green appealed this denial to the Alabama Department of Industrial Relations (the “ADIR”). On December 16, 2011, the ADIR hearing officer conducted an initial telephone hearing, at which a MOBIS representative was present. The hearing officer, however, concluded that she could not hold the hearing without the doctor’s notes that had formed the basis of Green’s termination. The hearing officer then continued the hearing to a later, unspecified date. The hearing officer stated that her docket clerk would select a new date and time and that the parties would receive notice of the new date and time by mail. On December 21, 2011, the ADIR mailed notices to Green and MOBIS stating that the appeal hearing would be re-convened on January 4, 2012. MOBIS’s plant was shut down for the 2011 holiday season from approximately December 23, 2011 through January 2, 2012. The mailed notice was not processed in time for MOBIS’s representative to learn the date of the hearing. As a result, no representative from MOBIS was present at the January 4, 2012 telephone hearing. Records of the January 4, 2012 hearing reveal that the ADIR hearing officer attempted to contact the MOBIS representative by phone without success. The 7 Case: 14-11328 Date Filed: 05/26/2015 Page: 8 of 21 ADIR hearing officer then proceeded to conduct the hearing, by telephone, with Green and her counsel. The hearing officer then issued a decision concluding Green was not terminated for misconduct that would disqualify her from receiving unemployment compensation benefits under Alabama law. 4 The ADIR’s Board of Appeals denied MOBIS's request for an appeal of that determination.