NATIONAL RAILROAD ADJUSTMENT BOARD
Charles W. Webster, Referee
PARTIES TO DISPUTE:
THE ORDER OF RAILROAD TELEGRAPHERS
NORFOLK SOUTHERN RAILWAY COMPANY
STATEMENT OF CLAIM:
Claim of the General Committee of ,The Order
of Railroad Telegraphers on the Norfolk Southern Railway that:
1. Article 1 and other rules of the Telegraphers' Agreement were
violated when and because the Carrier permitted or required the nontelegraph, non-telephone agent at Glendon, North Carolina, to transmit messages by telephone from Glendon to Raleigh, North Carolina
on January 3, 21 and 28, 1957; also to copy reports of record transmitted by telephone from Glenwood Yard (Raleigh) to Glendon on
April 2, 3, 9, 11, 16, 26 and May 10, 1957.
2. The senior idle operators, extra in preference, as of each of
these dates, shall be paid a day's pay because of such violations.
3. The agent-operator's rate of pay shall be restored to the Glendon agency position effective April 2, 1957, and continuing until such
time as the wires are removed from, at or about the station in accordance with the (Chicago) Memorandum of Agreement dated May 20,
1957 and Article 13(b) of the current schedule agreement.
NOTE: The date of April 3 in Item 1 above is a typographical
error and should read April 4, the date reflected in the
handling on the property.
EMPLOYES' STATEMENT OF FACTS:
Carrier's main line extends
westward from Norfolk, Virginia to Charlotte, North Carolina, a distance of
381 miles. Raleigh, North Carolina is located 226 miles from Norfolk. Glendon, North Carolina is situated 61 miles west of Raleigh.
The Agreement, published August 1, 1937,
listed Glendon under Article
32-Wage Scale, which provided:
",The minimum rate hereafter established for non-telegraph offices
referred to in Section (b) of Article 2 of this agreement will be
$62.50 per month, except at Glendon, Pantego, Northwest and Hailison. The minimum rate applicable to telegraph positions hereafter established will be 58¢ per hour on branch lines and 59¢ per hour on the
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over the telephone system, and Item 3 provides that the telephone system
may be used by anyone for necessary conversations and transmittal of oral
information; that is exactly what occurred here, the information transmitted
was oral and the mere fact that it may have been reduced to writing does not
make it a "report of record", as your Division has heretofore rightly held.
This submission is made in accordance with the provisions of motion
of the Third Division dated November 26, 1957, effective January 1, 1958,
and the carrier reserves to itself all of the rights accorded it under the provisions of said motion, and to make further reply, should it desire, to the
petitioners' submission, briefs and arguments.
(Exhibits not reproduced).
OPINION OF BOARD:
In Awards 9572, 9573, 10825, 10836 and 11509
which involved these same parties, this Board held that the use of telephones
by star agents in similar circumstances did not violate the agreement.
These prior awards are governing in the present dispute and therefore
the claim must be denied.
FINDINGS: The Third Division of the Adjustment Board, upon the whole
record and all the evidence, finds and holds:
That the parties waived oral hearing;
That the Carrier and the Employes involved in this dispute are respectively Carrier and Employes within the meaning of the Railway Labor Act,
as approved June 21, 1934;
That this Division of the Adjustment Board has jurisdiction over the
dispute involved herein; and
That the Agreement was not violated.
AWARD
Claim denied.
NATIONAL RAILROAD ADJUSTMENT BOARD
By Order of THIRD DIVISION
ATTEST: S. H. Schulty
Executive Secretary
Dated
at Chicago, Illinois, this 12th day of July 1963.