A tribunal case highlighted in a Chartered Institute of Personnel & Development article explores how businesses can fall foul of the requirement to make reasonable adjustments for disabled employees.
The EAT was asked to make a judgement on the original employment tribunal’s decision that the employer had failed to make reasonable adjustments around parking arrangements and that it had harassed the employee by sending an email to her that questioned her commitment.
The employee was able to work flexi-time and often arrived at work at 9.30am. By this time, the main work car park was full and the back-up parking facilities involved a long walk. The employer decided that the employee should arrive by 9am to overcome this problem. The employee was able to do this, although she was required to take her medication earlier in the morning to ensure that it had taken effect by the time she got to work.
In addition, a manager had sent an email to the employee after she had recently returned to work from stress. The email pointed to her negative attitude and her ‘capability or willingness’ to work within the company.
The employee raised a disability discrimination claim, stating that she should be provided with a reserved parking space close to the office building and that the email amounted to harassment. The tribunal agreed with her. The EAT partly agreed; it stated that the employer had in effect required the employee to make adjustments in relation to parking when the obligation clearly lay with the company. However, it stated that the email didn’t amount to harassment because it was questioning the employee about her absence (which was unrelated to her disability) and had not been intimidating, hostile or degrading.
This case clearly marks the responsibilities of employers to manage reasonable adjustments rather than impose requirements on the employee. It also provides welcome clarification on conduct that does – or doesn’t – fall within the definition of harassment.
Read Scrase Employment Law thoughts on this article here: Allocated parking space can be a reasonable adjustment.
