When is an employee’s claim for injuries against its nonsubscriber employer occurring in the course and scope of employment a health care liability claim?  According to the Supreme Court of Texas, when the employer is a health care provider. 

In Texas West Oaks Hosp. v. Williams, Williams was employed by a nonsubscriber psychiatric hospital.  Williams was

Texas is the only state that allows employers to opt-out of the workers’ compensation system.  Nonsubscriber status comes with benefits and disadvantagesWal-Mart Stores’ recent announcement that it would opt-out of the Texas workers’ compensation system is significant given that Wal-Mart is one of the largest private employers in the state.  

I invited Steve Bent

Today the Texas Supreme Court held that when an employee is employed by two employers (a staff leasing company and client company in this case) and both employers have workers’ compensation insurance, the workers’ compensation exclusivity provisions apply to bar negligence claims asserted by the deceased employee’s parents. You can review a copy of the

Recently, the Supreme Court of Texas heard oral arguments in an interesting case regarding the outer limits of the attorney-client privilege with respect to a workers’ compensation insurance carrier attorney’s communications with its insured.  The communications at issue were made between the carriers and the insured/employer during the administrative proceeding before the Texas Workers’ Compensation Commission over

Texas employers have the option of purchasing workers’ compensation insurance or going as a nonsubscriber.  Deciding whether to be a nonsubscriber or purchase workers’ compensation insurance requires an idea of what your anticipated workers’ compensation premium will be (usually obtained through your insurance broker) as well as understanding what legal protection a Texas employer gets by becoming

For more than 15 years Texas employers have used the application of uniformly enforced neutral absence control policies setting a maximum duration an employee can be away from work as a defense to workers’ compensation retaliation claims.  The defense was first solidified by the Supreme Court of Texas in in its 1996 Continental Coffee Prod. v. Casarez case.  See

The EEOC recently brought suit against the country’s largest home builder on behalf of a pregnant employee who was denied a period of unpaid leave in addition to the maximum permitted under the employer’s policies.  What is unique about this suit is that the EEOC brought the suit under the Americans with Disabilities Act rather than the Pregnancy

On April 3, 2009, the Supreme Court of Texas held that a premises owner who hires contractors to perform work on its premises and enters into agreements whereby the owner will provide workers’ compensation insurance to the contractor’s employees is entitled to the benefit of the exclusivity provisions of the workers’ compensation act and cannot be sued for