About duty to accommmodate
Employers and service providers have an obligation to adjust rules, policies or practices to enable everyone to participate fully. This obligation applies to needs that are related to the grounds of discrimination. It is called the duty to accommodate.
The duty to accommodate means that sometimes it is necessary to treat someone differently in order to prevent or reduce discrimination. It refers to the legal obligation that employers and service providers have to make changes to either physical spaces or policies to ensure that everyone can be included. For example, asking all job applicants to pass a written test may not be fair to a person with a visual disability. In such cases, the duty to accommodate may require that alternate arrangements be made to ensure that a person or group can fully participate.
Examples of duty to accommodate
- providing different equipment and software to meet the needs of people with visual impairments
- allowing an employee to take time off to attend a medical appointment
- managing an employee's schedule in a way that balances their work and caregiving obligations
- ensuring that people who use wheelchairs have full and equal access available to them
About undue hardship
It is also important to consider that there is a reasonable limit to how far an employer or service provider has to go to accommodate. Sometimes accommodation is not possible because it would cost too much, or create health or safety risks. This is known as undue hardship. An employer or service provider can claim undue hardship as the reason why certain policies or practices need to stay in place, even though they may have a negative effect. The employer or service provider will need to provide sufficient evidence.
Important An employee cannot hold out for the most ideal accommodation option if a reasonable accommodation is offered by the employer. Should an employee reject a reasonable solution that provides for accommodation, the employer will be found to have met their duty to accommodate.
Example of undue hardship
A pilot for a small airline develops a medical condition that limits his peripheral vision. Because of his condition, he is no longer allowed to fly planes. The airline has very few employees, and there are no other jobs to offer him. The employer could argue that keeping the pilot on their payroll would cause undue hardship, and that letting him go is their only option. They would have to justify this argument with sufficient evidence.