Opinion
March 9, 1959.
April 16, 1959.
Unemployment Compensation — Voluntary termination of employment — Necessitous circumstances — Burden of proof — Evidence — Employe in meat market — Unemployment Compensation Law.
1. In an unemployment compensation case, the burden is on the claimant to establish that necessitous circumstances compelled the termination of his employment.
2. In this case, in which it appeared that claimant, an employe in a meat market, terminated his employment because he was dissatisfied with the working conditions and the duties assigned to him, it was Held that claimant had not met the burden of establishing that necessitous circumstances compelled the termination of his employment and that the board properly concluded that he was disqualified from benefits, under § 402(b) of the Unemployment Compensation Law.
Before RHODES, P.J., HIRT, GUNTHER, WRIGHT, WOODSIDE, ERVIN and WATKINS, JJ.
Appeal, No. 46, March T., 1959, by claimant, from decision of Unemployment Compensation Board of Review, No. B-47984, in re claim of Anthony J. Pomorski. Decision affirmed.
Anthony J. Pomorski, appellant, in propria persona.
Sydney Reuben, Assistant Attorney General, and Anne X. Alpern, Attorney General, for appellee.
Submitted March 9, 1959.
Claimant, under his contract of hiring, performed a variety of work as an assistant to the owner in the operation of a retail meat market. He cut meat, dressed chickens, made deliveries, and also cleaned up the place. He worked for a period of but three and one half months. In this unemployment compensation case the board found: "On February 3, 1958, the claimant advised his employer that he was terminating his employment because he was dissatisfied with the working conditions and the duties assigned to him. Continuing work was available for the claimant had he desired to remain employed." At the hearings before the referee there was no capricious disregard of evidence favorable to the claimant and the above findings, amply supported as they are by competent evidence, are binding upon us. Section 510 of the Unemployment Compensation Law, 43 P. S. § 830. Tronieri Unempl. Compensation Case, 164 Pa. Super. 435, 65 A.2d 426. Upon these findings, the board concluded that claimant was disqualified from benefits under § 402(b) of the Law, 43 P. S. § 802(b) because his unemployment was due to voluntarily leaving his work without good cause.
The burden was on the claimant of establishing that necessitous circumstances compelled the termination of his employment. This burden was not met. The duties required of claimant were the usual duties of an employe in a meat market and working conditions in this shop were not abnormal; claimant clearly was not justified in leaving his work to join the ranks of the unemployed under the circumstances. Cf. Allen Unempl. Compensation Case, 174 Pa. Super. 514, 517, 102 A.2d 195.
The decision is affirmed.