Court Opinion

ID: 9724880
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 11:18:45.897222+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:25:07.431871
License: Public Domain

SULLIVAN, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent.
The majority casually dismisses the rationale of Love v. Heritage House Convalescent Center (2d Dist. decided January 24, 1983, ordered published upon Court's own motion May 24, 1984) Ind.App., 463 N.E.2d 478. Even a superficial examination of Love discloses that the employer there, as here, based its termination of the employee upon a written rule.
The decision of the Review Board appealed from in Love was, insofar as pertinent, as follows:
"On April 6, 1981 the claimant was discharged from her employment because [in violation of the rule] she incurred more than six absences in a six-month period (regardless of the reason for the absences) and because she incurred more than ten tardies in a twelve-month period.
CONCLUSIONS: An individual who is discharged for just cause is ineligible for benefit rights as provided in Chapter 15-1 of the Indiana Employment Act. The term 'discharged for just cause' is defined by the Act to include unsatisfactory attendance, if the individual cannot show good cause for absences or tardiness and knowing violation of a reasonable and uniformly enforced rule of an employer.
In this case, the employer's rule regarding attendance subjects an employee to discharge regardless of the reason for the absences. An employer's rule which subjects an employee to discharge for absences without regard to the reason for those absences is not a 'reasonable rule' for purposes of disqualification from unemployment benefits under Chapter 15-1. In this case, although the claimant may have violated the rule of the employer regarding attendance, the employer's rule regarding attendance is not a reasonable one under Chapter 15-1 of the Act. As a result, the referee concludes that the claimant did not knowingly violate a reasonable and uniformly enforced rule of the employer."
In resolving the central issue before us upon appeal, ie., whether the employee was discharged for just cause, we were required to consider and determine whether the rule in question was a reasonable rule *382and whether Love's discharge pursuant to the rule was for just cause. Our statement that "[a] rule which subjects an employee to discharge for excused, as well as unexcused absences, is unreasonable under I.C. 22-4-15-1(e)(2)" was therefore essential to the determination made in the Love case.
The majority opinion here acknowledges that the quoted statement in Love was essential to our determination in that case because an attempt is made to distinguish the employer's rule in Love from the rule in Jeffboat, Inc. as here considered. The fact remains that both cases involve, as an essential factor to the determinations, an employer's rule which punishes absences without regard to whether those absences are with or without good cause. If the majority wishes to disavow Love it should do so forthrightly.
I fully agree with the majority that Jeff-boat's absentee policy rule is enlightened and is liberally weighted in favor of the average employee. Many absences, late-nesses, ete. are permitted before sanctions or discharge is permitted. It is an eminently fair policy in terms of the right of an employer to maintain an adequately staffed place of work. The rule is not unfair to an employee who seeks to retain that employment despite frequent absences which adversely affect the employer's business. The employee has no right to continued employment under such circumstances.
The fact remains, however, that the rule is not a sufficient basis upon which to deny unemployment benefits to an employee terminated through no fault of his own.