Alabama Home Builders Self Insurers Fund, Inc. v. Tumlin, etc., [Ms. CL-2023-0901, Sep. 20, 2024] __ So. 3d __ (Ala. Civ. App. 2024). The court (Hanson, J.; Moore, P.J., and Fridy and Lewis, JJ., concur; Edwards, J., concurs in the result) reverses the Jefferson Circuit Court’s ruling that the statute of limitations barred the Alabama Home Builders Self Insurers Fund, Inc.’s claim for reimbursement of workers’ compensation death benefits paid to the surviving dependents of Timothy Tumlin who died as a result of a work-related accident.
The court first notes that “a workers’ compensation insurance carrier, such as the Fund, that acts on behalf of an employer to pay monetary benefits to survivors of a deceased employee may seek reimbursement under Ala. Code 1975, § 25-5-11(a).” Ms. *7. The court holds “the Fund paid only death benefits, i.e., compensation, see § 25-5-11(a) and Trott v. Brinks, Inc., 972 So. 2d 81, 83-87 (Ala. 2007)], as a result of the workers’ compensation action and that no amount of future medical benefits or vocational benefits is at issue in this matter. Thus, under the holding of Trott, the Fund’s claim under § 25-5-11(a) is more properly categorized as one seeking reimbursement, as the Fund urges, as opposed to asserting a subrogation claim, as the estate contends and the trial court ruled.” Ms. **12-13.
In reversing, the court holds that assuming without deciding that the Fund’s claim is governed by a two-year statute of limitations rather than the six-year statute applicable to claims for money had and received, the Fund’s “cause of action did not accrue for limitations purposes until, in early September 2022, the estate received settlement proceeds stemming from the wrongful-death action….” Ms. *15.