Company sued after refusing to let stroke victim work remotely

A utility company has been sued by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) for firing a girl who asked to work remotely after suffering a stroke.

On September 16, the EEOC filed a lawsuit against Osmose Utilities Services for allegedly refusing to accommodate the worker by allowing him to work remotely after his stroke, it reports. The worker’s role included handling customer inquiries, including submitting service requests by phone or electronically.

According to lawsuit after suffering a stroke, the girl asked to work from home full time due to her inability to drive and worsening stroke-related headaches attributable to office lighting. But management allegedly denied her request and a separate request to work from home two to three days per week when she had medical appointments.

Osmose allowed her to take day off for meetings but ultimately allegedly fired her when her supervisor questioned her absences and pressured her to stop attending, according to the filing. The company is now facing a lawsuit from the EEOC over allegations it violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) by denying reasonable accommodations to the worker and retaliating against her.

Central to most claims for distant work accommodations is the principle that under the ADA, an individual with a disability will not be considered a “qualified individual” if she or he cannot perform the essential functions of the job, with or with no reasonable accommodation, as defined by guidelines. These cases often hinge on whether the essential functions of the job should be performed on-site.

More and more firms are requiring employees to return to the office due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has forced many to switch to distant work. In September 2023, research found that 90% of firms plan to return to office work by the tip of 2024.

In Osmose’s case, the worker had previously been working remotely, together with others in her department, for several months during an office move. After the office returned to in-person work, the worker suffered a stroke that led to vision impairment, memory loss, and headaches.

The lawsuit claims that the girl’s role as a “Single Call Locator” might have been performed with the reasonable accommodations she requested. However, Osmose failed to show any undue hardship that those accommodations would have caused and is accused of wrongfully firing her.