In serious-accident litigation arising out of contractor-heavy supply chains, plaintiffs rarely stop with the driver and the motor carrier. They look upstream—often at a broker, platform, or logistics intermediary—and try to reframe that entity as the party that actually controlled the work. Hu v. XPO Logistics, LLC is a helpful company-side decision because it keeps the inquiry grounded: the Court of Appeal affirmed summary judgment where the record showed (1) the broker did not undertake carrier functions and (2) it did not actually control the carrier’s means and methods in any way that could support a tort duty.
Key points (so you know where this is going)
- California starts from a strong baseline rule: the hirer generally owes no duty to protect a contractor’s employees from workplace injuries, absent narrow exceptions.
- “Retained control” is not a vibes test. It requires actual exercise of control that affirmatively contributes to the injury.
- If you want to win these cases, treat them as evidence problems early: contracts help, but operational reality (and clean declarations) tends to decide summary judgment.
What happened
A shipper engaged XPO under a broker/shipper agreement to arrange interstate transportation. XPO, a federally licensed property broker, then engaged a motor carrier (Alliance) under a separate carrier agreement. In March 2020, Alliance’s driver lost control of the truck outside Oklahoma City; the plaintiff—an Alliance co-driver who was sleeping—suffered catastrophic injuries. He sued XPO for negligence, arguing XPO was “acting as” a carrier and therefore owed a nondelegable duty, or, at minimum, that XPO exercised enough control over transportation to owe him a duty of care.
The agreements mattered. But the court did not stop there. It focused on how the relationship worked in practice. The undisputed record showed Alliance selected drivers and routes, owned and maintained the truck, and controlled day-to-day operations. XPO did not employ drivers, own trucks, maintain a safety department, or direct how the driving was performed. XPO tracked shipment progress through software installed by the drivers and served as the communications conduit between shipper and carrier—functions the court treated as consistent with brokerage rather than transportation control.
The legal frame: the no-duty presumption and the exceptions plaintiffs need (but often can’t prove)
Because the plaintiff was an employee/contractor of the carrier—the independent contractor engaged in the chain—California law begins with a strong presumption: the hirer generally owes no duty of care to protect the contractor’s employees from workplace injuries. The court grounded its analysis in the Supreme Court’s modern articulation of that presumption and its exceptions.
Two exceptions were central:
1) Nondelegable duty
Certain activities performed under a public franchise and involving special risk can create duties that cannot be delegated. The court rejected that theory here because XPO was not a licensed motor carrier, and the evidence did not support treating it as one despite the plaintiff’s “acting as” framing.
2) Retained control (requiring actual exercise and affirmative contribution)
Even when duties are generally delegable, a hirer can owe a duty if it retained control over the manner of performance and actually exercised that control in a way that affirmatively contributed to the injury. On this record, the court found no triable issue: nothing showed XPO directed safety practices, maintenance, training, driver selection, routing, or other “how” decisions that would have mattered for the crash.
This is the part worth underlining. Plaintiffs often try to convert ordinary coordination—status calls, tracking, scheduling—into “control.” Hu treats that move skeptically. Without evidence of operational direction over means and methods, those facts generally do not get you past summary judgment.
Why the federal “broker vs. carrier” cargo framework did not move the duty analysis
Plaintiffs commonly cite federal cases distinguishing brokers from carriers in cargo-damage disputes (often under the Carmack Amendment), emphasizing whether the intermediary held itself out to the shipper as having overall responsibility for the shipment. The court drew a clean boundary: that cargo-damage framework does not answer the California personal-injury duty question for a contractor’s employee. Different setting, different question, different test.
Company-side takeaways: what Hu rewards (and what plaintiffs will try to repackage as “control”)
For brokers, logistics intermediaries, and other “in-the-middle” companies, Hu reads like a checklist of risk-reducing features—especially when the record is built to support them:
- Keep “how” decisions with the carrier/contractor. Courts look hardest at means and methods (safety, training, maintenance, driver selection, routing). If your ops team starts issuing directives in those areas, you are handing plaintiffs their best argument.
- Contracts matter, but conduct matters more. The agreements allocated exclusive supervision and control to the carrier, and the record supported that allocation in practice. If operations drift from the paper, plaintiffs will live in that gap.
- Tracking and visibility are generally not “control,” standing alone. Passive tracking tools and acting as the communication hub did not create a triable issue where they were not paired with operational direction.
- Audit “carrier” labels in customer-facing documents. The shipper’s bill of lading identified XPO as “carrier,” and the court still found that insufficient given the broader record and contractual clarifications. Even so, this is an avoidable fight. Clean up templates and workflows so you’re not donating language.
- Build the summary-judgment record early. The win here is as much about evidentiary discipline as doctrine: declarations, agreements, and undisputed operational facts showing who did what (and who did not).
Practical close: a Monday-morning audit that pays for itself
If your business depends on third-party carriers, installers, technicians, or other contractors, Hu reinforces a straightforward risk rule: you can oversee outcomes without owning the means. Review (1) contract allocations, (2) operational playbooks, and (3) document templates through that lens—particularly where safety and high-severity exposure are in the background.
This post is for general informational purposes and does not constitute legal advice.
For internal linking on the Horst site, this post pairs naturally with prior resources on summary judgment strategy, independent contractor risk allocation, and contract drafting to avoid unintended duty/control (including indemnity and insurance provisions), as well as any transportation or supply-chain dispute content.