Last week, a divided Franklin County Court of Appeals affirmed the denial of unemployment compensation to a claimant who had given notice of resignation and then a week later failed to return to work. Boynton v. Ohio Dept. of Job & Family Servs., 2022-Ohio-2597. The Court found that the employee did not have “just cause” to resign her position because she had failed to first attempt to resolve any issues with her employer before submitting her resignation. Moreover, her physician had stated that he had not placed her on work restrictions or advised her to quit her job, rendering her medical complaints irrelevant.
According to the Court’s opinion, the claimant had worked as
a cashier for a retail establishment for a few years. Because of, among other things, lower back
pain, her employer had accommodated all of her requests, including reducing her
work hours and permitting her to rest one leg on a basket. However, one day, she indicated that she was
giving her two-week notice of resignation for several reasons, including to
care for her ill fiancé, her low back
pain and dissatisfaction with the employee rewards system. After a disagreement with a co-worker a week
later, however, she informed the manager about her emotional distress, and left
work early. She later told her manager
that she would not be returning to finish her two-week notice because of COVID
concerns.
The Court noted that employees cannot receive unemployment
compensation following a voluntary resignation unless they had just cause to
resign
"Traditionally, just cause, in the statutory sense, is that which,
to an ordinarily intelligent person, is a justifiable reason for doing or not
doing a particular act." Rider v. Dir., Ohio Dept. of Job & Family
Servs., 10th Dist. No. 16AP-854, 2017-Ohio-8716, ¶ 9. Under this standard,
" 'an employee is required to cooperate with the employer to resolve
work-related problems. * * * If the employee does not cooperate or give the
employer sufficient time to accommodate the employee's needs [and] concerns,
that employee will usually not be found to have just cause if he or she quits.'
" . . . " 'Essentially, an employee must notify the employer of the
problem and request it be resolved, and thus give the employer an opportunity
to solve the problem before the employee quits the job; those employees who do
not provide such notice ordinarily will be deemed to quit without just cause,
and, therefore, will not be entitled to unemployment benefits.' "
The claimant did not dispute that she failed to discuss her
reasons for resignation with her employer before her resignation, except with respect
to her medical ailments. However,
again, there was no evidence that she had ever indicated that the
accommodations that she had requested and been provided were inadequate prior
to her resignation (although there was evidence that the accommodations had not
resolved her back pain issues). She had
provided with her unemployment application a statement from her treating physician
that he had never placed her on work restrictions or advised her to resign, but
that she would know when it was time to leave.
The ODJFS found that she lacked good cause to resign because
she had not attempted to resolve with her employer any of these three issues
before giving notice. The Court’s majority
found that there was adequate evidence in the record to support this
conclusion.
The dissent found that the physician’s comment that “she
will know when it is time to not work anymore” satisfied her burden of proving
good cause because it was clear no reasonable accommodation would be possible
to permit her to continue working as a cashier.
The employer also had been on notice that her prior accommodations had
not solved the issue with her back pain, but made no further suggestions. Further,
the dissent would not penalize her for leaving work prior to the completion of
her two-week notice because she had been unwell and was legitimately concerned
about COVID.
