( Steamship Clerks, Freight Handlers,
 Express and Station Employes
 PARTIES TO DISPUTE:


STATEMENT OF CLAIM: Claim of the System Committee of the Brotherhood

(a) The Southern Pacific Transportation Company violated the Clerks' Agreement when it dismissed Mr. R. D. Bristow from service following formal investigation at which its charge was not sustained and,

 (b) The Southern Pacific Transportation Company shall now be required to reinstate Mr. Bristow and to allow one days' compensation at the rate of Relief Posit and continuing each work day thereafter, plus insurance, seniority and all other rights unimpaired, until he is returned to service.

 I OPINION OF BOARD: Following an investigation conducted on October 13,
 1977, claimant, who had been in Carrier's service as a clerk since May 21, 1973, was dismissed from service on October 28, 1977, for alleged violation of the second paragraph of Carrier's Rule 810, which reads:

The Board has carefully reviewed the transcript of the inyestigation conducted prior to claimant submissions of the parties. The record shows that claimant frequently laid off sick, but in each case he telephoned his employer for permission to be absent and all such requests were gran
                  Docket Number CL-22719 "


Based upon the entire record, the Board is of the considered opinion that Carrier's actions in dismissing claimant for accumulated absences, each of which absence was handled in the usual manner and authorized by supervisory personnel, was arbitrary and unreasonable. If the Carrier were in doubt as to claimant's illnesses, it could have required him to furnish a doctor's statement in each instance, or could have had him examined by Carrier's designated Company physician to evaluate his physical condition to continue in service.

 Our attention has also been called to the fact that absence because of illness is excluded from the Leave of Absence Rule (Rule 39) of the Agreement.

 Based upon the record before it, the Board cannot uphold the Carrier's dismissal of claimant. Neither does the Board feel justified, in view of claimant's absentee record, in awarding him pay for each day from date of dismissal, as claimed. We will award that claimant be restored to service with seniority rights unimpaired, and that he be compensated for each day lost, except for the first six months following his dismissal, or from April 28, 1978, his earnings from that date be computed in accordance with Rule 52 of the applicable Agreement.

 The Organization has submitted no Agreement support for that portion of the claim pertaining to insurance, and it is 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 violated.

                  Award Number 22693 Page 3

                  Docket Number CL-22719

                  A W A R D


        Claim sustained to the extent indicated in Opinion.


                        NATIONAL RAILROAD ADJUSTMENT BOARD

                        By Order of Third Division


ATTEST;
        Executive Secretary


Dated at Chicago, Illinois, this 11th day of January 1980.