(Brotherhood of Railway, Airline and Steamship ( Clerks, Freight Handlers, Express and ( Station Employees PARTIES TO DISPUTE: (Bangor and Aroostook Railroad Company

1. Carrier violated the Agreement, particularly Rules 1(b) and 2(b), when it permitted, Mr. B. A. Sawyer, its Freight Claim Agent and Mr. T. A. Mercier, Chief Claim Adjuster, both, Carrier Officials, (Claimants Supervisors) to operate and produce from a Xerox machine, 888 copies of various claims during the period of March 28-31, 1972 inclusive.

 2. Carrier shall compensate Claim Analyst Clerk, Mr. R. J. Laffey for twenty-five (25) hours pay at pro-rata in depriving him of this work.

 OPINION OF BOARD: Over a four day period in March 1972, two non-agree
 ment employes duplicated by Xerox some 888 potato
 shipment claims which related to some impending litigation. Claimant held
 the position of Claim Analyst in Carrier's Accounting Department. The
 duplicating involved about twenty-five hours of work.

 Petitioner relies on Rule 1(b), Rule 2, Rule 3(b) and Rule 16(e) in support of its position that the work should have been assigned to Claimant - or otherwise not removed from the Scope of the Agreement. Those Rules provide:





"Rule 2 - DEFINITION OF CLERK

 (a) Employes who devote four (4) hour; or more of their time on any day to writing and calculating incident to keeping records and accounts, writing and transcribing letters, bills, reports, statements and si telephoning in connection therewith, and to the operation of office mechanical equipment or devices as are now used in the performance of such work, or as may hereafter be adopted, shall be designated as clerks or clerical workers. The foregoing definition shall not be construed to apply to office boys, messengers and chore boys or other employes doing similar work nor to employes engag office or station appliances or devices, such as those for perforating papers, addressing envelopes, duplicating letters and statements, numbering forms or oth adjusting dictaphone _ylinders.

 (b) It shall not be permissible under Paragraph (a) of this rule to assign clerical work occurring within the spread of the hours of assignment to more than one position not classified as a clerk for the purpos the time devoted to such work by one employe below four (4) hours per day."

 "Rule 3 - SENIORITY DISTRICTS

 (b) Within the confines of each seniority district, employes have prior rights in accordance wit of service within the district (fitness and ability being sufficient) to promotion, assignment, displacement and work. It shall therefore, not be permissible to assign an employe to a part or the whole of the work of one or more positions in other seniority districts except as otherwise specifically provided in these rules."

 "Rule 16 - DAY'S WORK AND OVERTLVIE

 (e) Where work is required by the Carrier to be performed on a day which is not a part of any as it may be performed by an available extra or unassigned employe who will otherwise not have forty hours of work that week; in all other cases by the regular employe."


While admitting that non-Agreement personnel use the photo copying equipment, Petitioner urges that when the volume of copying reaches the proportion that it did herein, it is no longer incidental work and is clearly clerical work under the Agreement.

 Carrier argues that there was no removal of work or positions of work from the Agreement. Carrier states that over many years, without challenge from the Organiza Carrier contends that covered employes have not been vested with exclusive rights to operate copying the definition of clerks or clerical work the task of operating equipment for the purpose of duplicating letters or statements.

 In support of its argument, Petitioner relies in part on Awards 19719, 19769, 19783 and 19999 all of which involved the same parties and rules as those herein. All of those Awards may be distinguished from this dispute in that they involved work or positions which were clearly covered by the Scope Rule, whereas that point is at issue herein.

 Petitioner's argument is based on the hypothesis that work has been removed from Agreement in violation of Rule 1(b). Since it is admitted that photo copying work employes, the argument maintains in effect that the volume of work involved in this dispute is determinative of exclusivity. We do not accept this theory, since it has neither rule support nor logic to back it. Since the work in question is not specifically covered by the language of the Agreement and there is no eviden by the covered employes, there can be no basis for the contention that it has been removed from the Scope of the Agreement. The Claim must be denied.



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









                          By Order of Third Division


ATTEST: 4.0~7w, &4z2e..."
        Executive Secretary


Dated at Chicago, Illinois, this 28th day of June 1974.