On October 24, 2014, counsel for the employee petitioned the Workers’ Compensation Court of Appeals for Roraff^[1] fees for time expended in representing the employee in an appeal before this court decided in 2013.  Having concluded that the petition does not comport with the specific requirements of statute, case law, and court procedural rules, we deny the request for additional fees on appeal.

On June 20, 2013, the employee appealed the Findings and Order of Compensation Judge Penny D. Johnson, denying the employee’s request that his wife be paid an hourly rate for her services in driving him from their home in Alexandria to the Twin Cities for two medical appointments for his work-related injury while he was medically unable to drive.  The employer and insurer cross-appealed from an award of certain other expenses.  The matter was decided by this court without oral argument, on the briefs submitted by the parties.  In our opinion,^[2] we reversed the denial of payment for the employee’s wife’s driving services, and remanded the matter to the compensation judge to determine a reasonable value for such services.  We affirmed the compensation judge with respect to the issues raised in the cross-appeal.

As part of our opinion, we awarded the employee’s attorney $1,250.00 as and for attorney fees on appeal.  No appeal was taken from our decision.  The employer and insurer paid the $1,250.00 fee award on December 30, 2013.

On October 27, 2014, the employee’s attorney filed a Statement of Attorney Fees with this court, seeking Roraff fees in the amount of $3,925.50 for 12.1 hours of attorney and paralegal time spent in the preparation of the 2013 appeal to this court.

The employer and insurer filed an objection to the Statement of Attorney Fees on October 30, 2014.

Minn. Stat. § 176.511, subd. 3, provides that “[w]here upon an appeal to the Workers’ Compensation Court of Appeals, an award of compensation is affirmed, or modified and affirmed, or an order disallowing compensation is reversed, the Workers’ Compensation Court of Appeals may include in its award as an incident to its review on appeal an amount to cover a reasonable attorney’s fee, or it may allow the fee in a proceeding to tax disbursements.”

Our court rules of practice require that any petitions for the taxation of actual and necessary costs and disbursements must be filed “within 45 days of the filing of the final appellate decision in the main action.”^[3]  Historically, this court has construed the statute and rule together, as effectively providing that a petition seeking attorney fees related to an appeal before this court should be filed within 45 days of this court’s decision.^[4]

The employee’s counsel indirectly addresses the question of timeliness by pointing out that language elsewhere in the workers’ compensation act grants this court continuing jurisdiction over attorney fees.  She submits that this court should rely on that statutory grant of authority when considering a petition of appellate fees.  In essence, counsel for the employee argues that this court has the power to waive any procedural rule limiting the time within which such a petition may be filed, and that we need not apply any time limitation to revisiting the sufficiency of any attorney fees we have awarded on appeal.

We acknowledge that there is statutory authority which permits this court to raise the issue of fees “at any time” in a workers’ compensation matter.^[5]  However, we decline to exercise this broad discretionary authority to disturb a settled issue once significant time has passed.  In the present case, fees were awarded as part of our 2013 decision, no appeal or objection was taken from the fees awarded, and the petition for additional fees was filed more than ten months after we issued our final decision in the case.  As we are unaware of any unusual circumstances that warrant reopening the question of fees on appeal, we decline to do so.