Opinion ID: 271751
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Coughlin's Hiring Hall Fees

Text: 30 Coughlin paid registration fees of $60 during three quarters of 1962 for use of National Maritime Union hiring halls. The Board approved deduction of the $60 from Coughlin's gross interim earnings as expenses incurred seeking new employment which exceeded expenses he would have incurred in employment with respondent. See 5 Williston, Contracts § 1359 (Rev. ed. 1937). We also approve the deduction. 31 The hiring halls assessed identical fees against union and non-union registrants. See NLRB v. Houston Maritime Association, 5 Cir. 1964, 337 F.2d 333, 336. Charges paid by union members were designated union dues and were equivalent to the registration fee which a non-union seaman would have to pay for use of the hall. 32 The respondent would treat Coughlin's fees as union dues non-deductible from gross interim earnings under the rule of West Texas Utilities Co., 109 NLRB 936, 938 (1954). But in West Texas the discharged employee voluntarily paid union dues although his interim employment was in an open shop. The excess of the interim dues over dues he would have paid if working for his former employer was not deductible, because dues were not a compulsory expense of obtaining interim employment. Here, whether labeled union dues or registration fees, hiring hall charges were compulsory expenses of Coughlin's interim employment. They were therefore properly deducted from his gross interim earnings.