(Brotherhood of Railway, Airline and ( Steamship Clerks, Freight Handlers, ( Express and Station Employes PARTIES TO DISPUTE: (Bessemer and Lake Erie Railrcad Company



1. Carrier violated the effective Clerks' Agreement when on certain dates specified below, it failed to properly fill positions of vacationing employes;

2. Carrier shall now compensate Ms. Eileen M. Walker for fortyeight (48) hours' pay at the pro-r Position for the period from October 10 through October 21, 1977;

3. The Carrier shall now compensate Ms. Carol L. Bennett and Mr. William S. Zanolli for-,four (4) hours' pay each at the pro-rata rate of an Assistant Machine Operator Position for November 18, 1977.

OPINION OF BOARD: The claims in this dispute involve absences of regular
employes on account of vacations or illness. It is
the Organization's position that Carrier failed to observe correctly the
relevant provisions of the National Vacation Agreement, particularly
Articles 6 and 10 paragraph (b), and Agreement Rules 4 (day's work and
overtime) and 7 (absorbing time) when it assigned a keypunch operator to
perform the work of an assistant machine operator who was on vacation from
October 10 through 21, 1977 and an assistant machine operator to perform
the work of a machine operator who was absent on November-18, 1977. It
contends that in both cases the position of the absent employe should have
been filled by Claimants Walker, Bennett and Zanolli in accordance with
the aforementioned Rules.

Carrier, contrawise, contests this interpretative position and asserts that these Rules are inapplicable to these situations, since the positions were filled by moving up employes working on the same shift pursuant to the Memorandum of Agreement, Case 1025, past practice and compensated according to Agreement Rule 16 (Preservation of Rates).



Moreover, it contends that the Organization's ex parts submission contained numerous exhibits and assertions such as: the Data Processing Equipment Assignment Sheets, the statements of Machine Operator Zanolli and Assistant Machine Operator Mikoloski, the correlative statement made on p. 8 that an undue burden was placed an them in direct violation of Circular No. 1's requirements.

In reviewing this case, we concur with Carrier that the above stated inclusions were not handled or discussed on the property in contravention of Circular 1 and t We do find, however, after carefully examining the Organization's submission and supportive evidence that it failed to demonstrate persuasively that Rules 4 and 7 and the pertinent articles of the National Vacation Agreement were consistently applied in this fashion an the property. Rule 4 does not require that vacancies must be filled for part or all of a shift, when the work can be handled under existing rules, agreements or practice and the Memorandum of Agreement Case 1025 permits an employs from the same shift to handle the duties of an absent employe through move up procedures. We do not find Rule 7 applicable herein, since the Claimants were not required to suspend work and it is not a violation of the absorbing agreement per se to assign a regularly assigned employe to fill the vacancy of the regularly assigned vacationing employe. (See Third Division Award 21660) In the instant case, the Key Punch Operator and the Assistant Machine Operator were paid the higher rate consistent with Agreement Rule 16.

Upon the record then, we do not find that the instant claims were supported by the evidence and we must accordingly deny them.

        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 Number 22921 Page 3

                    Docket Number CL-22998

                    A W A R D


        Claim denied.


                            NATIONAL RAILROAD ADJUSTMENT BOARD

                            By Order of Third Division


ATTEST: aelee~l~

        Executive Secretary


Dated at Chicago, Illinois, this 22nd day of July 1980.