Liability for a borrowed preparer's collision most likely lands on the tax practice that sent her out, not on the staffing agency, in the AC502 Unit 4 agency liability problem. Searches like "ac 502 unit 4 assignment example", "ac502 unit 4 sample" and "ac502 unit 4 example" land here.
What a finished AC502 Unit 4 agency liability problem looks like
Around four pages that keep four parties in view: the staffing agency as general employer, the composite tax practice as borrowing employer, the preparer as agent, and the florist whose van was struck. A short fact list opens it. The agency pays her wages and can reassign her; the practice sets her hours and tasks; a manager sent her across town in her own car to deliver signed returns, with an instruction to come straight back. She delivered them, drove nine miles in the other direction to collect a cake, and struck the van shortly after rejoining the direct route. The analysis first settles that she is an employee rather than a contractor, then tests scope of employment leg by leg, and only then asks which employer controlled the act.
How a AC502 Unit 4 example is structured
Rules come before facts at each step, and the steps run in the order a court would take them. Status is short: hourly pay, set hours and supervised work make her someone's employee. Scope of employment takes the most space and is applied separately to three legs of the trip, because the answer changes along the road. The delivery leg is plainly within scope. The cake leg is a frolic, an independent course of conduct serving no purpose of the practice, and the manager's instruction confirms it. The return leg is the contested one, and the problem weighs re-entry once she rejoined the authorized route intending to get back to work. Only then does it ask which employer answers, applying the borrowed-servant test of control over the specific act. A final section covers her own liability and the staffing agreement's indemnity clause.
Four parties, one road
Agency, borrowing practice, preparer and florist, set out with who pays her, who directs her daily work and who sent her across town.
Delivery, cake, return
Scope tested separately on each leg of the drive, since one verdict for the whole trip hides where the practice's exposure begins and ends.
A frolic nine miles long
The cake run served no purpose of the practice, and the instruction to return directly confirms that this leg stood outside scope.
Back on the route
Re-entry weighed once she rejoined the direct road with the aim of returning to work, the question on which the outcome turns.
Control of this errand
The borrowed-servant test applied to the delivery the practice ordered, with the agency's general employment weighed against that specific control.
Where marks go in AC502 Unit 4
Graders begin with the parties, and a paper that names one employer and stops has answered a question the problem never asked. Treating the whole trip as one unit is the next failure: a verdict that she was on company business, or on a personal errand, erases the leg-by-leg analysis where the marks sit. The instruction to come straight back is often misread as ending scope automatically, when authorized work done in a forbidden manner can remain within it; the instruction matters here because the cake served no purpose of the practice. Borrowed-servant analysis earns credit only when control is tied to this errand rather than to employment in general. Missing the preparer's personal liability costs a mark, and reading the indemnity clause as a defense against the florist misplaces it.
Get a AC502 Unit 4 example written to your instructions
Lay out the Unit 4 scenario with every party and instruction it mentions, and attach the rubric. Status, then scope leg by leg, then which principal answers: the analysis returns in the order a court would take those questions, inside 24-48h. Nothing is charged for a first sample, and the preparer, practice and agency are all fictional.
AC502 Unit 4 questions, answered
Could both the agency and the practice be liable?
In some jurisdictions, yes. Courts applying a strict borrowed-servant rule place liability on the single employer that controlled the act, while others allow a dual-employment finding in which both answer to the injured party. The example applies the control test, concludes the practice is the stronger target, and names the dual approach as the result a different court could reach.
Does the instruction to come straight back protect the practice?
Not by itself. Employers remain liable for authorized work performed in a forbidden manner, so an instruction alone rarely takes conduct outside scope. It matters in this scenario because the cake run served no purpose of the practice at all. The example uses the instruction as evidence that the detour was personal, never as a freestanding defense.
What does the staffing agreement's indemnity clause change?
It decides which business ultimately bears the cost, not whether the florist can recover. If the practice agreed to indemnify the agency for claims arising from work it supervised, the agency could shift any judgment against it back to the practice. The example handles the clause in one paragraph after liability to the florist is settled, keeping the two questions apart.