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Employment Equality/Reasonable Accomodation

  • 20-12-2008 4:38pm
    #1
    LegacyUser
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 166,026 ✭✭✭✭


    A friend of friend has been having problems with an employer. The job is admin/office work. He has been working there for 3 years. Has been through the company's disciplinary process and was given final written warning a month ago. In the middle of that process, he told them that the quality of his work (all of the employers complaints relate to underperformance in current position) was being affected by the volume of the work and a physcological illness for which he has been taking medication.
    At this point, the employer arranged for appointment with company doctor - who provided a report stating he was not fit for this position.

    Someone told me that they have a duty under equality legislation to take his disability into account on the basis of 'reasonable accomodation'. Does their doctors report negate their responsibilities in this instance?
    If its a case that performance (errors made in course of work) and workload are affected by the disability, do they still have an obligation to employ him taking this into consideration?

    Any help on this would be very gratefully appreciated as I would like to help him in his situation.


Comments

  • #2
    Darragh29
    Closed Accounts Posts: 7,097 ✭✭✭Darragh29


    unregged_reg wrote: »
    A friend of friend has been having problems with an employer. The job is admin/office work. He has been working there for 3 years. Has been through the company's disciplinary process and was given final written warning a month ago. In the middle of that process, he told them that the quality of his work (all of the employers complaints relate to underperformance in current position) was being affected by the volume of the work and a physcological illness for which he has been taking medication.
    At this point, the employer arranged for appointment with company doctor - who provided a report stating he was not fit for this position.

    Someone told me that they have a duty under equality legislation to take his disability into account on the basis of 'reasonable accomodation'. Does their doctors report negate their responsibilities in this instance?
    If its a case that performance (errors made in course of work) and workload are affected by the disability, do they still have an obligation to employ him taking this into consideration?

    Any help on this would be very gratefully appreciated as I would like to help him in his situation.

    I've been down this very road before with an employer OP. My best advice to you is to get him to get his own medical report from his specialist. In the case of a psychological illness, he should get a report from a Psychologist, not a GP. You are correct when you say that the employer has a responsibility to take his disability into account in this situation.

    There is considerable legal caselaw in this area, you can read case decisions that have been issued by the Equality Tribunal on their website and you will find many cases that involve the subject of reasonable accomodation...

    http://www.equalitytribunal.ie


  • #3
    LegacyUser
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 166,026 ✭✭✭✭LegacyUser


    Thanks for your post Darragh - particularly advice ref. doctors report.
    They are likely to stick to the line of 'not fit for this job' on the basis of their doctors report and also they have pieced together a list of mistakes he has made over many months. Everybody else in the place makes mistakes but of course we have no access to this.

    However, if they saw fit to give him a full time contract after 1 year in the job - and there was absolutely no disciplinary process of any kind during this time, can this be taken as confirmation by the company themselves that they were of the opinion that he was fit for the work?? He's been doing exactly the same duties since day 1 with the company.


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