Mississippi: Employer’s Effort to Categorize Worker as Independent Contractor Unsuccessful

Substantial evidence supported the Commission’s finding that an injured worker was an employee, and not an independent contractor, where evidence suggested the worker, a car detailer, was required to work exclusively for the purported employer, was instructed to maintain his hours by punching a timecard, was paid by the hour—receiving additional cash payments for work performed on behalf of the dominant shareholder’s farm. That the worker signed a paper writing indicating he was an independent contractor and received 1099 forms, rather than W–2 forms, did not control as those matters related mostly to tax issues. Moreover, the appellate court held substantial evidence supported the Commission’s finding that while the purported employer had segregated his business into three separate entities, in reality, he had operated those three businesses as one entity or unit. The Commission aggregated the number of employees and found that the employer employed at least five persons [see Miss. Code Ann. § 71–3–5].

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is the co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law (LexisNexis).

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance. Bracketed citations link to lexis.com.

See Southeastern Auto Brokers v. Graves, 2015 Miss. App. LEXIS 205 (Apr. 14, 2015) [2015 Miss. App. LEXIS 205 (Apr. 14, 2015)]

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 61.03 [61.03]

Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law.

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