Court Opinion

ID: 9620086
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 05:38:10.601806+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:57:57.751154
License: Public Domain

MINTON, C.J., and NOBLE and VENTERS, JJ.,
dissent by separate opinion.
DISSENTING OPINION
The decision of the Court of Appeals should be reversed. The ALJ did not err in dismissing the claim because no evidence compelled a finding of timely notice. Workers' compensation is statutory. Nothing in Chapter 342 evinces the intent to permit a worker to bypass the employer and give notice of an accident and a resulting injury to the employer's insurance carrier. In fact, the plain language of the relevant statutes evinces the opposite intent.
KRS 342.185 is explicit. It requires notice of a work-related accident to be given to the employer "as soon as practicable." Although KRS 342.360 requires all workers' compensation policies to provide that knowledge of an injury by the insured employer constitutes notice to the employer's insurance carrier, it neither states nor implies that notice to the carrier constitutes notice to the employer. Notice of an accident and the resulting harm does not comply with KRS 342.185 if the worker's conduct thwarts the purposes of the requirement.1 Viewing the carrier as being an employer's agent or representative for the purpose of the notice requirement thwarts the purpose of the requirement and may prejudice the employer.
Among the purposes of requiring a worker to notify the employer of an accident and resulting injury "as soon as practicable" are: to enable the employer to provide prompt medical treatment in an *544attempt to minimize the worker's ultimate disability and the employer's lability, to enable the employer to make a prompt investigation of the cireumstances of the accident, and to prevent the filing of fictitious claims.2 Another purpose is to enable the employer to take prompt action to prevent similar injuries to other workers. As the real party in interest and the party who controls the workplace, the employer has immediate reasons to need to know, for example, that there is a slippery area on the floor of the plant or that the catch on an extension ladder or another piece of equipment has malfunctioned. Permitting a worker to bypass the employer by giving notice to the carrier delays the employer's opportunity to address the problem, thwarts one of the purposes of the requirement, and prejudices the employer if another worker is injured as a consequence.
The claimant alleged that an injury occurred three weeks before June 12, 2003, when he fell off the tracks of a bulldozer. He admitted that he failed to notify Trico of the incident, and the ALJ did not believe his testimony that he notified Perry Music, or Kenneth Keaton of a subsequent injury on June 12, 2003. The ALJ determined that he did not give the employer notice of either alleged injury until he filed his claim on January 8, 2004. Convinced that any injury occurred in the earlier incident and that notice given seven months after the injury was not "as soon as practicable", the ALJ dismissed the claim. The decision was reasonable under the evidence.3
The Court of Appeals erred by reversing because the ALJ construed KRS 342.185 properly and because the evidence did not compel a finding that the claimant gave timely notice of the alleged injuries.
MINTON, C.J., and NOBLE and VENTERS, JJ., join in this dissenting opinion.

. See Whittle v. General Mills, Inc., 252 S.W.2d 55 (Ky.1952); T.W. Samuels Distillery v. Houck, 296 Ky. 323, 176 SW.2d 890 (1943); Buckles v. Kroger Grocery & Baking Co., 280 Ky. 644, 134 S.W.2d 221 (1939).

. See Harlan Fuel Co. v. Burkhart, 296 SW.2d 722 (Ky.1956).

. Special Fund v. Francis, 708 S.W.2d 641, 643 (Ky.1986).