## Facts

- A rural milk-truck route required the driver to visit farms six days a week, collect full milk cans, drop off empties, and deliver milk to a dairy processor.
- Percell worked for the dairy as a “field man and office help,” but separately contracted with the dairy to haul milk from farmers.
- Percell bought the truck (chassis), paid for its maintenance and insurance, and operated the hauling arrangement.
- Percell hired drivers, including Ceradsky, paid their wages, withheld taxes, and issued W-2 forms.
- The dairy purchased an insulated truck bed mounted on Percell’s truck and placed its logo on the truck bed.
- The dairy’s plant manager sometimes reprimanded Ceradsky when farmers complained, but Percell was Ceradsky’s primary supervisor.
- Ceradsky was killed while performing the milk route; his dependents sought workers’ compensation death benefits from the dairy.

## Issues

1. Whether Ceradsky was an employee of the dairy for workers’ compensation purposes or an employee of Percell as an independent contractor.
2. Whether the dairy retained a sufficient right to control the means and manner of the hauling work (as opposed to only the result) to create an employment relationship.

## Decision

- The Missouri Court of Appeals affirmed the denial of workers’ compensation death benefits against the dairy.
- The court held Percell was an independent contractor and Ceradsky was Percell’s employee, not the dairy’s.
- The court concluded the dairy did not retain the right to control the means and manner of the hauling work, despite providing an insulated truck bed, branding the truck, and occasionally reprimanding the driver.

## Legal Principles

- Employee status for workers’ compensation turns primarily on whether the alleged employer has the right to control the means and manner of the work, not merely the result to be achieved.
- Factors bearing on the right-to-control inquiry include who provides equipment, who pays wages, who withholds taxes, who hires and fires, and who directs day-to-day performance; the right of control predominates.
- Quality-related supervision and protection of business relationships (including complaints-driven reprimands and branding) may show interest in results but do not, without control over operational details, establish an employment relationship.
- Where a contractor owns and maintains the vehicle, carries insurance, and handles payroll and tax withholding for drivers, those facts strongly indicate an independent contractor arrangement.

## Conclusion

Because Percell controlled the hauling operation’s essential details—equipment responsibility, payroll and tax administration, and direct supervision—and the dairy’s involvement reflected oversight of results rather than control of methods, the court treated Percell as an independent contractor and affirmed denial of death benefits against the dairy.


Ceradsky v. Mid-Am. Dairymen, Inc., 583 S.W.2d 193 (Mo. Ct. App. 1979)