Opinion ID: 222830
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: General Office Clerk Jobs

Text: Weatherbee contends that the VE's testimony regarding his ability to perform some general office clerk jobs obviously conflicted with the DOT and that the ALJ failed to investigate these discrepancies. He claims that the VE referenced only the occupation of Office Clerk (listed at Section 209.562-010 of the DOT ) when stating that [t]here would be some general office clerk jobs that are [classified as] unskilled sedentary. Weatherbee believes that the VE's testimony directly and apparently conflicts with the DOT because the DOT entry for Office Clerk describes the job as non-sedentary and semi-skilled. We reject Weatherbee's interpretation of the VE's testimony. When read in the context of the VE's adjacent testimony, it is clear that the VE's discussion of office clerk jobs was meant to refer to a broad category of jobs that the DOT describes as clerical, not to the single occupation listed in Section 209.562-010 of the DOT. Almost immediately after stating that an individual with Weatherbee's impairments could work in some general office clerk jobs, the VE added that a sample occupational title would be Document Preparer. The fact that the VE provided the Document Preparer occupationlisted in Section 249.587-018 of the DOT as an example of a clerk position clearly indicates that she was using the term clerk in a general sense. The VE's use of the term in this manner is consistent with its usage throughout the DOT. See, e.g., Dep't of Labor, Dictionary of Occupational Titles §§ 221-229, 243-249 (occupational entries for a variety of different clerk positions). Hence, the VE's testimony regarding Weatherbee's ability to perform some general office clerk positions did not conflict with the DOT.