# Storage & Processors, Inc. v. Reyes

> Texas Supreme Court · April 2, 2004 · 47 Tex. Sup. Ct. J. 405

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9512828

## Case

- **Full name:** STORAGE & PROCESSORS, INC. and Leonel Guerrero, Petitioners, v. Ramon REYES, Respondent
- **Court:** Texas Supreme Court
- **Decided:** April 2, 2004
- **Citations:** 47 Tex. Sup. Ct. J. 405; 134 S.W.3d 190; 2004 Tex. LEXIS 302; 2004 WL 726913
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Schneider
- **Judges:** Phillips, Schneider
- **Cited by:** 120 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9512828

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- noting that “[a]lthough the Legislature ten weeks later amended the Labor Code to prohibit pre-injury waivers, Lawrence remains the law for those claims, like Reyes’, brought by workers who both signed non-subscriber agreements and suffered injury before [the amendment]”
- holding that Texas’ strong public policy for Workers’ Compensation favors even a radical extension of the doctrine to less-than-total-exculpation waivers where workers are involved
- finding when both parties have actual knowledge of the Mitchell Const. Co. v. Superior Commercial Concrete, LLC Page 9 terms, an agreement can be enforced even if the fair notice requirements were not satisfied
- recognizing that a “contract which fails to satisfy either of the fair notice requirements when they are imposed is unenforceable as a matter of law”
- holding that indemnitee had the burden of showing indemnitor's actual knowledge of the terms of an employee benefits plan

## Opinion text

Justice SCHNEIDER,
concurring.
I fully agree with the Court that an employer must satisfy the fair notice requirements of the express-negligence doctrine and conspicuousness when it enrolls employees in a non-subscriber workers’ compensation benefits plan.
But I write separately to note that there is an additional reason why the fair notice requirements should apply to all nonsub-scriber agreements. Workers entering into these agreements are uniformly less sophisticated than the employers who draft them. It is unlikely that many workers are even aware of what exactly they are giving up by agreeing that they can neither sue their employer nor receive subscriber-level benefits in the event they are injured. Reyes is a prime example. A non-English speaker, he allegedly received a summary of the plan in Spanish, but the contract that he signed was in English. Moreover, it is undisputed that the waiver was not conspicuous.
Of course, not all contracts between sophisticated and unsophisticated parties must meet the fair notice requirements. But, because non-subscriber worker’s compensation plans are exclusively drafted by more sophisticated parties and offered to less sophisticated parties, there is a strong public policy justification to require those *195 agreements to meet both requirements. Accordingly, I join the Court’s opinion and concur in its judgment.

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9512828. Public record. Not legal advice.