Opinion
June 16, 1960.
September 16, 1960.
Unemployment Compensation — Voluntary termination of employment — Burden of proof of cause of necessitous and compelling nature — Dissatisfaction with working conditions after one day's trial — Unemployment Compensation Law.
1. In an unemployment compensation case, the burden is upon a claimant who voluntarily left his employment to establish cause of a necessitous and compelling nature.
2. In this case, in which it appeared that claimant alleged that he terminated his employment after working one day because the job was misrepresented, but the board found upon competent evidence that the job had been fully explained to him, and that claimant further asserted that he could not have continued on the job because of a serious bowel condition but presented no medical testimony that the work was injurious to his health, it was Held that claimant left his employment without cause of a necessitous and compelling nature within the meaning of § 402(b) of the Unemployment Compensation Law.
Before RHODES, P.J., GUNTHER, WRIGHT, WOODSIDE, ERVIN, WATKINS, and MONTGOMERY, JJ.
Appeal, No. 137, Oct. T., 1960, by claimant, from decision of Unemployment Compensation Board of Review, No. B-55533, in re claim of Walter B. Yerger. Decision affirmed.
Walter B. Yerger, appellant, in propria persona, submitted a brief.
Sydney Reuben, Assistant Attorney General, with him Anne X. Alpern, Attorney General, for Unemployment Compensation Board of Review, appellee.
Argued June 16, 1960.
The sole question raised by this unemployment compensation appeal is whether the claimant voluntarily left his employment without cause of a necessitous and compelling nature within the meaning of § 402(b) of the Unemployment Compensation Law, 43 P. S. § 802 (b). The bureau, the referee and the board all found claimant ineligible for benefits.
On August 31, 1959 claimant was assigned to duty as a plant guard at the Dana Corporation plant in Pottstown, Pennsylvania. The duties of the job were explained to him at the time he was hired. After working one day he terminated his employment because, he alleged, "the job was misrepresented." He was not laid off nor discharged and continuing work was available to him had he chosen to remain employed. He claimed that he could not continue on the job because of a serious bowel condition but presented no medical testimony that the work was injurious to his health. The board found that the job had been fully explained to him. The record contains competent testimony to this effect and the board's finding is, therefore, conclusive.
The claimant himself testified that he had not been treated for his diarrhea condition by a doctor nor had he been in a hospital for the condition within the last two or three years. The plant representative testified that if claimant needed to go to the bathroom, he could telephone the other guard and go.
Since claimant voluntarily terminated his employment, he had the burden of showing cause of a necessitous and compelling nature for so doing: Johnson Unemployment Compensation Case, 182 Pa. Super. 138, 125 A.2d 458. Mere dissatisfaction with working conditions, after one day's trial, does not constitute cause of a necessitous and compelling nature for voluntary termination of employment: Smith Unemployment Compensation Case, 181 Pa. Super. 185, 124 A.2d 707.
Decision affirmed.