CopyPublished | Florida 1st District Court of Appeal | 2014 WL 1257131, 2014 Fla. App. LEXIS 4495
...to a knee surgery. The two disputed late payments accounted for just $200 of the total penalty paid by the School Board ($100 per infraction). The School Board filed a petition requesting Administrative Procedure Act-based review in accordance with § 440.525(3)....
...The office shall require that all compensation benefits are timely paid in accordance with this section. The office shall impose penalties for late payments of compensation that are below a minimum 95 percent timely payment performance standard. See also § 440.525, Fla....
...s case because §
440.021 requires matters involving disputed penalties to be referred to the JCC. 1 DFS counters that its audits do not consist of adjudications of employee benefits claims as would fall under the jurisdiction of a JCC. But, rather, §
440.525(2) authorizes DFS to audit claims-handling entities like the School Board, and impose penalties where chapter 440’s requirements are not met. DFS argues that it followed the correct §
440.525(3)-based process here by serving a written audit report of the violations and providing the School Board with APA-based review....
...1st DCA 2006) (quoting City of St. Petersburg v. Pinellas County Power Co.,
87 Fla. 315 ,
100 So. 509, 510 (1924)). 3 In this case, we conclude that the two applicable statutes can be read together to make available both a DFS audit report-focused review process as contemplated in §
440.525(3) (an APA-based process) and a §
440.021 review process before the JCC for resolving narrower disputes involving only the amount of the penalty or interest assessment, given the ultimate results of the audit report or the APA-based review of same. Parsing the statutes, the Legislature in §
440.525, subsection 3, allows for an APA-based review of “the results of [DFS’s] examination or investigation.” The process described in subsection 3 certainly encompasses challenges to the findings in an audit report, whereas this subsection wholly omits any reference to penalties per se, or avenues by which a carrier or claims handling entity can challenge penalty amounts ultimately assessed by DFS. Conversely, §
440.525, subsection Jp, and §
440.021, when read together, provide for a different review process related to penalty assessments. See n. 1, 2 supra. When an audited entity challenges the penalty assessment itself — the amount of the penalty — referral is required to a JCC. Different from the audit report merits phase prescribed by §
440.525(3) (an APA-based process), penalty phase review before a JCC narrowly concerns the issue of whether DFS’s “penalty or interest” assessment calculation comports with legal requirements. See §§
440.525(4),
440.021, Fla....
...by the statutes insofar as, besides its jurisdictional argument, it challenged only the underlying merits of DFS’s findings. The School Board asked for and received review of DFS’s late-payment determination under chapter 120 in accordance with § 440.525(3)....
...If the department does not agree with the protest, it shall refer the matter to the judge of compensation claims for determination pursuant to s.
440.25(2)-(5). Such action of the department is exempt from the provisions of chapter 120. (Emphasis added). . Section
440.525 states, in relevant part: (3) ......
