Federal law protects job applicants with disabilities in many ways. One of those ways is that new employees do not have to divulge disability accommodations during the hiring process. One employer, Maryland-based All Day Medical Care Clinic, LLC, found out that discriminating against an employee who requested accommodations after being hired would land them in hot water with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). The EEOC alleges that All Day violated the Americans with Disabilities Act, so they filed a lawsuit against them.
According the lawsuit, All Day hired a scheduling assistant for one of their five different clinics. When the assistant went to work on her first day, she requested accommodations for her vision impairment. The employer asked why she didn’t raise these issues during her interview, then terminated her. A vocational representative for the employee offered to fund the accommodations, but the clinic ignored both the terminated employee and her representative.
The EEOC contends that the employer violated the ADA, which prohibits employers from asking about disabilities prior to a job offer. In addition, employers are also prohibited from refusing to work with an employee with disabilities who requests reasonable accommodations. Employers are supposed to engage in an interactive process to find a solution that is reasonable and safe for both the employer and employee. Debra Lawrence, regional attorney for the EEOC’s Philadelphia District Office, said, “Under the ADA, job applicants do not need to reveal their disabilities before being hired.”
The EEOC’s lawsuit seeks monetary damages, in the form of back pay and punitive damages for the employee, as well as injunctive relief that usually includes training of company owners and managers to prevent future discrimination. Employees should not be concerned that requesting a reasonable accommodation to help them perform their job will mean that they lose their job. Employers need to do better. If you need more information about disability discrimination, the EEOC offers many resources on their website.
Dawn Brotherton is a Sr. Staff Writer at The American Genius with an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Central Oklahoma. She is an experienced business writer with over 10 years of experience in SEO and content creation. Since 2017, she has earned $60K+ in grant writing for a local community center, which assists disadvantaged adults in the area.
