Court Opinion

ID: 9752494
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 18:09:31.188451+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:27:16.839930
License: Public Domain

FLAHERTY, Justice,
dissenting.
I dissent. The issue is not whether the No-Fault Motor Vehicle Insurance Act1 allows an exception to the prohibition on suits by employees against employers, but rather whether an employer’s no-fault carrier is exempted from complying with its independently contracted for duty to compensate injured parties. Here, unlike the situation in Turner v. Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority, 256 Pa.Super. 43, 389 A.2d 591 (1978), neither an employer nor an employer’s workmen’s compensation insurance carrier is being sued. Section 303 of the Workmen’s Compensation Act2 clearly limits the liability of “employers” but provides no basis for a no-fault insurance company to escape liability by assuming the cloak of an employer.
*172Whether, if sued, the no-fault insurance company would in fact owe compensation under the terms of its contract is not determinative of whether the insurance company shares the employer’s immunity from suit. Nor is it significant that no-fault is required coverage rather than a voluntarily bargained for employee fringe benefit: the contractual obligation is the same regardless of the reason coverage was obtained. The majority opinion authored by Mr. Justice O’Brien makes reference to the No-Fault Act's declared policy of assuring all accident victims compensation, but denies no-fault compensation in appellant’s case. Such a result too broadly interprets the immunity established by the Workmen’s Compensation Act and provides a windfall escape from liability for insurance companies.

. Act of July 19, 1974, P.L. 489, No. 176, art. I, § 101, et seq., 40 P.S. § 1009. 101, et seq. (Supp. 1979-80).

. As amended, Act of December 5, 1974, P.L. 782, No. 263, § 6, 77 P.S. § 481(a) (Supp.1979-80).