How did the railroads ensure that inaccurate watches were not used?

[lak611]

I know the railroads required that watches be inspected and removed from service for repair if they did not keep accurate time.

On Confused Colonial's thread, he asked about who was responsible for paying for the repair.

What would prevent a railroad man from setting his watch himself to adjust the time discrepancy before visiting the inspector if he did not want to pay for the repair costs? I am sure that there were dishonest men back then just like there are now. How did the railroads prevent this from happening?

[Jacob Bunn]

Laura, When a RR watch required service or repair, it was the employee's responsibility for payment for the service. If the watch should fail inspection and be condemned by the inspector, it was the employees responsibility to buy a new watch. This was controversial, as the inspector was the one who sold the new watches. There are records of numerous union grievences on this practice.

An employee was strictly forbidden to reset the time on his watch. These were clear cut and strictly enforced rules. If an employee was caught resetting the time on his watch, it was a disciplinary offense, usually ending up in termination of work.

Tom

[lak611]

How would they know if the employee set the time on his own?

[Bill Kapp]

On the NAWCC board, Jeff Hess posted the minutes of meetings Ball had with his inspectors.

There was a lively discussion about the coincidence that many watches brought to them agreed with the train station watch nearly to the second, thus arousing suspicions that they had been reset !

Happy hunting

[Robert Smothers]

What if the railroad employee forgot to wind his watch while off duty, resulting in an acute stoppage of time keeping. Would he be fired, or allowed to reset, and restart the watch?

[Jacob Bunn]

Robert, Somewhere I have seen it written--that is if a watch was run down, it could be reset, but only in the presence of the station agent or other supervisory personel, and then documented that it was reset.

Tom