Factory-Work Packaging Yogurt Was Not “Suitable Employment” for a Skilled Carpenter

The Third Department reversed the Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board’s determination claimant was not eligible for unemployment insurance benefits because he refused suitable employment.  Claimant is a skilled carpenter.  He refused a yogurt-packaging job in a factory.  The yogurt-packaging job was not, under the circumstances, “suitable employment” for the claimant:

Pursuant to Labor Law § 593 (2), a claimant who refuses “an offer of employment for which he or she is reasonably fitted by training and experience” will be disqualified from receiving unemployment insurance benefits … . Significantly, a “claimant need not accept every job offered but, rather[,] only those job offers which bear a reasonable relationship to [the] claimant’s skills” … . Here, it is undisputed that claimant was skilled in finish carpentry and had no experience working in a factory. Consequently, substantial evidence does not support the Board’s decision that he refused an offer of suitable employer … . The Board’s decision, in fact, runs contrary to a similar case in which the Board awarded benefits to another claimant who worked at the millwork company as a skilled craftsman and refused the same offer to work as a packager in a yogurt factory … . In view of the foregoing, the Board’s decision must be reversed. Matter of Reisen (Commissioner of Labor), 2015 NY Slip Op 05560, 3rd Dept 6-25-15