As you may be aware, anti-discrimination law states that you cannot treat an employee with a disability less favourably than you would treat any other employee.
This means that before saying you cant hire or keep someone with a disability, Employers must ask themselves “is it reasonable to implement adjustments for the employee?”
The definition is a little clumsy but in essence reasonable adjustments are adjustments that do not impose an unjustifiable hardship on your business. Including physical, practical and financial hardships. For example a reasonable adjustments include:
- offering flexible hours of work
- modifying work stations or work areas
- changing telephone or IT system
- installing ramps
If an Employee fails to make reasonable adjustments for an employee with a disability, and this failure has impact of treating the employee less favourably than an one without the disability, it might be argued that the employee with a disability was unlawfully discriminated against.
In circumstances where this becomes relevant please seek advice from HR Central to ensure you meet all the EEO requirements.