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Form 1 NATIONAL RAILROAD ADJUSTMENT BOARD Award No. 935'9
SECOND DIVISION Docket No.
9050
2-SPT-MA-183
The Second Division consisted of the regular members and in
addition Referee John Phillip Linn when award was rendered.
( International Association of Machinists and
Parties to Dispute: ( Aerospace Workers
Southern Pacific Transportation Company (Pacific Line:;)
Hispute: Claim of Employee:
1. That under the current Agreement Machinist M. Williams (hereinafter
referred to as Claimant) was improperly dismissed from the service of
the Carrier on July 12,
1979·
2. That, accordingly, the Carrier be ordered to restore Claimant to
service with seniority and service rights unimpaired and with
compensation for all wage loss from date of dismissal to date of
restoration to service.
Findings
The Second Division of the Adjustment Board, upon the whole record and a1.1
the evidence, finds that:
The carrier or carriers and the employe or employee involved in this dispute
are respectively .carrier and employe within the meaning of the Railway Labor Act
as approved June 21,
193+.
This Division of the Adjustment Board has jurisdiction over the dispute
involved herein.
Parties to said dispute waived right of appearance at hearing thereon.
Claimant Williams entered the service of the Carrier on February 1,
1971.
His employment as a Machinist spas terminated on July 12,
1979
far alleged violation
of Rule 810 of the Carrier's General Rules and Regulations after a formal hearing
on June 22,
1979
to develop the facts and to place responsibility, if any, in
connection with Claimant's absence from duty beginning March 1,
1979,
through
May 18,
1979,
during which time Claimant missed
57
working days.
Rule 810 provides in pertinent part:
"Employes ... must not absent themselves from their
employment without proper authority. They must not
engage in other business which interferes with their
performance of service with the Company unless advance
written permission is obtained from the proper officer
...
A current copy of the General Rules and Regulations were posted and accessible
for all employee to read. Claimant admittedly was familiar with Rule 810.
Form 1 Award No. 9359
Page
2
Docket No.
9050
2-SPT-MA-' 83
Claimant submitted written Request for Leave of Absence (Form C.S.
2696),
pursuant to Rule
24
of the Motive Power and Car Departments Agreement, which
provides
"If requirements of the service will permit, employes will,
an request, be granted leave of absence, not exceeding
ninety
(90)
days, with privilege of renewal. An employe
absent on leave, who engages in ct her employment, will lose
his seniority, unless other provisions are made by the
proper officials and committee representing his craft.
Denial of a reasonable amount of leave (service permitting),
or failure to promptly handle requests for leave, account
sickness or a business matter of importance to the employe,
is an improper practice and may be handled as unjust
treatment, under this Agreement."
Claimant's Form C.S.
2696
requested leave of absence (LOA) from February
26,
1979
to May
26, 1979
on account of "family problems out of state". The printed
form has space for the signatures of (1) the Iu®ediate Supervisor,
(2)
the
Superintendent, Division Engineer, Master Mechanic, or Department Head, and
(3)
the Division, Department, Etc. The printed form shows that the four copies of
that completed form are to be sent to the employe involved, Personnel Services -
SF, the Supervisor, and the Timekeeper.
1001
Claimant submitted his signed LOA request form personally to his inmnediate
supervisor, Machinist Foreman Gordon Fetterly, at 8:00 p.m. on February
27,
1979·
On that date Claimant was scheduled to work the
3:00
P.m. to 11:00 P.m.
shift at the Carrier's Los Angeles Diesel Shop.
Fetterly testified that at the time he received the LOA request form he
told Claimant that he "would submit it for approval". Soon thereafter, Fetterly
handed the request, unsigned by him, to his immediate second shift supervisor,
General Foreman
I. M. Sutton.
Fetterly did not recommend approval of Claimant's WA request because
Claimant worked in the M-40 cycle area where there was a heavy work load and
Fetterly believed that he needed every man there to make the schedules that had
been set for him. However, Fetterly did not advise Claimant of this at the time
he accepted the LOA request form from Claimant because, according to Fetterly,
he had to give the matter same consideration and Claimant was on the shift for
only about five minutes on February
27.
Similarly, General Foreman Sutton did not approve or sign Claimant's LOA
request form for the reason, stated at the formal hearing in June,
1979,
that
"we have contracted with the machinist to work forty hours a week, and Mr.
Williams worked in the
M-40
cycle area where it is vitally important that every
man show up and does his job, keep the program going, and keep production going."
Sutton believed that Claimant's absence would have cut production.
Form 1 Award No. 9359
Page 3 Docket No.
9050
2-sPr-MA-'83
Sutton, who was not authorized to approve LOAs in excess of twenty-nine
days, placed the subject request form in an outgoing mail box on his desk for
later delivery, by himself, to the Assistant Plant Manager in the main office.
The Assistant Plant Manager and the Plant Manager orally advised Sutton that
Claimant's LOA request would not be approved. In turn, Sutton orally notified
Fetterly of that fact.
Claimant admitted at the formal hearing in June,
1979
that his mediate
supervisor, Fetterly, "did not say one way or the other whether it (the requested
LOA, was going to be approved," and he did not know, as of the time he absented
himself from work, whether his requested LOA was approved.
Indeed, when Claimant briefly spoke to Fetterly about the requested LOA,
and explained that he had to leave the state because of family problems, Fetterly
advised Claimant that the matter was going to take time for processing. Claimant
admittedly told Fetterly then that he had to leave immediately--and that is what
he did.
On or about March
6, 1979,
Claimant had his wife contact Fetterly to
determine whether the LOA request was approved. Fetterly told Claimant's wife
that the requested leave was disapproved. Although Claimant then knew that he
was absent from work without authorization, Claimant remained away from work
through May
18, 1979
° without any contact with Carrier management - because as
he viewed the situation he had no choice in the matter. He had to remain away
from work and out of state attending to his family problems with or without
authorized LOA.
Claimant returned to work on May 21,
1979
without ever offering any reason
for his unauthorized absence other than "family problems out of state". On
that date, he was cited for the formal hearing held on June 22,
1979·
Claimant had requested and had been granted a leave of absence during the
early years of his employment with the Carrier. At that time he had taken his
request for leave of Absence to General Foreman Sutton, and was made aware of
the procedure to follow in the process of securing an authorized LOA.
Claimant's record of absenteeism with the Carrier is not a favorable one. In
1974
and
1975
two memoranda were placed in his record regarding educational talks
pertaining to Rule 810 because of absences from his assigned working area and
continued tardiness. In June,
1978
Claimant had been dismissed under Rules 810
and "A", for being away from his duty post with alcoholic beverage in his
possession. He had been reinstated in November,
1978
on a leniency basis. On
February 18,
1979,
he received 60 demerits for irregular attendance from
November,
1978
through February,
1979
in violation of Rule 810.
It is the position of the employes in this case that the Carrier was guilty
of "shoddy handling" of the Claimant's leave request; that the failure on the
part of management to communicate with Claimant was the primary cause of the
allegation that Claimant violated Rule 810; that Claimant fully explained to
his supervisor his reasons for wanting a IAA which were valid and never
questioned by management; that Fetterly misled Claimant by giving the impression
F orm 1
Page
4
Award No. 9359
Docket No.
9050
2-SPT-MA-183
that the mediate supervisor approved the leave; that Fetterly and Sutton should
have told Claimant they had no intention of recommending or approving the LOA; that
the leave request was improperly ignored and shunted to a filing cabinet; that
Claimant submitted his request for leave in good faith, and that the Carrier had
an obligation to process the request in good faith, but that the Carrier's handling
of the request was an improper practice as defined by Rule
24
and represented
unjust treatment towards Claimant; that the Carrier failed in its duty to
communicate denial of Claimant's LOA an the basis of service requirements due to
the fact that service requirements were such that no emergency existed which wVuld
have precluded granting of a leave; and that management chooses to ignore the
leave provisions of Rule
24
and to not grant ZQAs for any cause due to a maintenance system which places an management the obligation to meet a monthly
production quota, with failure to meet that quota bringing reprimands from
superiors.
These bases for the position of the employes are unpersuasive to the Board, -
primarily because to the extent they are with significance factually unsupported
in the record of this ease.
By the time action on the request was to be taken by an official authorized
to approve or disapprove it, Claimant had knowingly absented himself
without authorization and his whereabouts were unknown
to
management or the
Union Committeemen. When Claimant learned on or about March
6, 1979,
that his
request was not approved, through the telephone conversation between Claimant's
wife and Claimant's immediate supervisor, Claimant continued his absence from
work without authorization and without further explanation to the Carrier of
the need to be absent and without inquiry as to whether the requirements of the
service would permit approval of any part of the requested leave.
Under the circumstances, the Board does not find that Claimant properly
processed his request for leave or acted in good faith, and it does not find that
the Carrier handled the request improperly or in a manner constituting an improper
practice under Rule
24
or unjustly treated Claimant in light of Claimant's conduct.
Claimant's violation of Rule 810 before such time as management could reasonably be expected to act on the requested leave is controlling in this case.
Claimant's unauthorized leave is determined to be just cause to support his
dismissal from employment of the Carrier. Claimant's past violations of Rule
810 serve as aggravating circumstances in support of the propriety of the
dismissal action.
A W A R D
Claim denied.
Attest: Acting Executive Secretary
ional Railroad Adjustment Board
NATIONAL RAIIRQAD ADrTUSTMENT BOARD
By Order of Second Division
By
emarie Brasch - Administrative Assistant
Dated at Chicago, Illinois, this 26th day of January, 1983.