MAGIC WORDS NOT REQUIRED
What if you tell your supervisor that you are finding it very difficult to accomplish an assigned task because of a physical or mental problem and he does nothing? Then, soon thereafter you get an unacceptable performance rating and not long after that a removal notice. Can you file a disability discrimination case even if you never formally requested a reasonable accommodation?
YUP, you sure can and you have a good chance of winning because of the supervisor’s failure to act.
EEOC just decided a case stating, “When making an accommodation request, an employee is not required to use the “magic” words “reasonable accommodation….Instead, the employee need only inform the Agency that he or she needs an adjustment or change at work for a reason related to a medical condition.” The Commission noted it had founding a complainant’s request for advance sick leave constituted a request for a reasonable accommodation; and another complainant’s claim that her supervisor failed to act after she reported that a coworker’s cologne caused her to experience asthma-like symptoms alleges a denial of reasonable accommodation.
In this case, EEOC ruled that the Complainant established that he has a disability for purposes of the Rehabilitation Act because
he stated that his doctor has told him that he should not perform any heavy lifting due to his chronic back pain. (A doctor’s or other health professional’s confirmation of a need for an accommodation is not required in all cases, but very helpful. In this case, the Agency does not dispute that Complainant is a qualified individual with a disability.
It then found that the involved agency officials who knew of the employee’s problem violated the Rehabilitation Act when they took no action even after Complainant communicated that he had chronic back pain and the heavy lifting he was being asked to do exacerbated it.” When the agency tried to defend itself by establishing that the Complainant did not formally request accommodation, EEOC responded, “that this reflects a rigidly formalistic approach to the reasonable accommodation process that is not in accordance with the law. We emphasize that an employee is not required to use the “magic” words “reasonable accommodation” when making a request. All an employee is required to do is tell the Agency that he needs an adjustment or change at work for a reason related to a medical condition.”
An Agency is required to make reasonable accommodation to the known physical and mental limitations of a qualified individual with a disability unless the Agency can show that accommodation would cause an undue hardship. “Generalized conclusions will not suffice to support a claim of undue hardship. Rather, a showing of undue hardship must be based on an individualized assessment of current circumstances that show that a specific reasonable accommodation would cause significant difficulty or expense.”
EEOC wrapped up by writing, “Where an agency makes a ‘good faith’ effort to reasonably accommodate the complainant, it may be insulated from an obligation to pay compensatory damages. In this case, we find that Complainant is entitled to compensatory damages for the Agency’s failure to accommodate him because, as stated earlier, there is no evidence that the Agency made a good faith effort to accommodate him.
Although the employee in this case did not get an unacceptable rating or fired, he did have to take a lot of leave to deal with the pain. Consequently, EEOC ordered the agency to restore his leave, pay him compensatory damages, and consider disciplining the involved managers. For more details, check out Mario G., v. Brooke Rollins,
Department of Agriculture, EEOC No. 2023002840 (2026).
