(Brotherhood of Railway, Airline and
 ( Steamship Clerks, Freight Handlers,
 ( Express and Station Employes
 PARTIES TO DISPUTE:
 (Pacific Fruit Express Company

(a) The Pacific Fruit Express Company violated the current Clerks' Agreement when it ruled that disqualification of Mrs. Marva J. Bell was justified by evidence adduced at investigation held August 7, 1974, and,

 (b) The Pacific Fruit Express Company shall now be required to allow Mrs. Marva J. Bell eight hours' compensation at Rate of Senior Audit Clerk Position R-69 starting July 19, 1974 and continuing each day thereafter until she is reinstated to said position.

 OPINION OF BOARD: Claimant had a full and fair opportunity to present
 her views in the investigation stage and to learn
 from the Carrier the basis for her disqualification as a Senior Audit
 Clerk; therefore, there is no basis to sustain Claimant's objections as
 to the procedure by which she was disqualified.

 On the merits, Claimant bid for and was awarded the job of Senior Audit Clerk on March 19, 1974. Four months later, the Carrier disqualified Claimant from her job, effective July 18, 1974, relying on Rule 8. This rule provides:



          "may displace the junior assigned clerk, if there is one, before being required to displace the junior assigned employe."


Clearly management has the responsibility to determine whether an employe who is assigned to a bulletined position has demonstrated the required fitness and ability for the job. Absent an arbitrary decision by the Carrier and so long as the employe has had a reasonable time to demonstrate his or her fitness and ability to perform the job, the burden rests on Claimant to show by a preponderance of the evidence that she is in fact fit and able to do the reouired work.

 The Claimant has not met this burden. The length of time in which Claimant had to qualify for the job was reasonable and the direct and specific testimony of supervisors and managers in her department about her substandard work were more than sufficient to establish that the Carrier acted in good faith and in accordance with a reasonable judgment about the capability of the Claimant to do the work. Finding that she was not fit and able for the position, the Carrier was justified in disqualifying her from the job.

 Experienced arbitrators know that in all industry one of the most difficult problems to decide under collective bargaining agreements is the problem of the junior employe being promoted over the senior employe. The great majority of agreements outside the railroad industry have a promotion clause in which the presumption that the senior employee bidding on a job shall be selected is conditioned by a phrase which leaves discretion in management to compare the fitness and ability of the candidates competing for the promotion and where, in the judgment of management, the junior employe has superior ability or fitness or education or experience, etc. such employe and not the senior employe is promoted. Understandably, the unions resist such decisions by management because they undermine the principle of seniority on which a labor organization depends so much.

 In this case, however, the presumption that the senior qualified employe shall be promoted seems to be undiminished (see Rule 7); rather, management, under the collective bargaining agreement in Rule 8, has reserved the right, in a transition period of a reasonable amount of time, to determine whether or not that employe is ready to assume the required responsibilities of the job. Such approach to recognizing the critically important right of the employe to depend on his seniority to protect him in his job, and to be promoted, is substantially more favorable from the employes' standpoint than the common approach in other industries, which leaves considerable discretion with management at a
                      Award Number 21544 Page 3

                      Docket Number CL-21284


much earlier stage in the promotion process (and sometimes with respect to reduction in force) to determine who will get - or keep - the job.

 Under the circumstances, it is understandable that when the employer, as in this case, is evaluating an employe during the qualifying period, it should have considerable discretion in judging whether or not that employe is fit and able to do the required work.

 Under all the facts and circumstances, the Claimant had a full and fair opportunity to question the judgment of management about the basis for her disqualification; the Claimant has not met her burden to show that the Carrier was arbitrary in deciding that she was not qualified for the job; and, to the contrary, the Carrier showed that the employe, after having had a reasonable time to learn her job, failed to reach that level of fitness and ability sufficient for her to hold the job. Accordingly, the claim should 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.


                      A W A R D


        Claim denied.


                            NATIONAL RAILROAD ADJUSTMENT BOARD

                            By Order of Third Division


ATTEST: ,~ ,~o~.
        Executive Secretary


        Dated at Chicago, Illinois, this 31st day of May 1977.