Hi All,
I'm not an attorney, so I don't know for sure. What I seem to remember
from reading the ADA (U.S., of course) is that employers can ask for
proof of disability before granting an accommodation though they don't
have to if the disability is self-evident. What my experience has been
is that most employers and HR departments are cringingly ignorant about
disability. They seem to think that accommodations are going to be
complicated and expensive and that said accommodations will have a
negative impact on productivity either because the disabled person will
take longer to do X or because able-bodied people will somehow have to
work around this obstruction. My experience has also been that HR
departments sometimes request proof of disability to delay hiring or
implementing.
All that said, multiple employers have required that I provide a
doctor's note to verify I am totally blind even though I use a white
cane, read braille, and have eyes that are visibly nonfunctional. Some
have also required that the doctor specify what accommodations I'll
need. This is hard since I haven't been to an eye doctor since my early
twenties. The last time I had to provide this type of documentation,
was for my current job. I wound up going to my GP with one of my old
doctor's notes, which said I'm totally and permanently blind,. the GP
wrote something like: "This patient is blind, and I'm reading a note
from an ophthalmologist that says she's totally and permanently blind.
Grant whatever accommodations she may need. More specifics are outside
my purview."
Of course, in my case, as in your daughter's, accommodations are
minimal. If I were her, I would just turn on Magnifier and keep doing
that until I were specifically told I couldn't. I say this, not as a
rebel, but as a pragmatic person. I do a small amount of computer work
on the job, so I use Narrator. This works most of the time, but
sometimes Narrator is buggy, especially on the web, so I made several
accommodations requests to install NVDA on my work computer. At first, I
got a lot of confused blah-blah; then I got radio silence. So one
frustrating day, I simply tried downloading and installing NVDA,
thinking I might not be able to because of firewalls, etc. It turns out
that I didn't have any trouble, and no one from IT or HR has ever said
anything to me about this strange piece of software I'm using I've been
running off and on for the past two years.
Photocopying is trickier because offices usually keep track of that. If
your daughter is photocopying a relatively small number of pages, I
would just photocopy until someone told me there was a problem. If it's
a large number of pages or if there are lots of controls about what/how
much can be copied, then she might have to process the accommodation
request in the official way.
But again, my experience is that employers' ideas of what an
accommodation is are so far removed from reality that they often fail to
understand that this thing that I'm asking for and that is neither
complicated nor expensive, is a request they need to respond to.
Just my two cents.
Ciao
On 1/28/2022 10:28 AM, East, Robin wrote:
> The "duty to Accommodate" may be governed under different statutes. If this is in Canada then there is a Federal law and there are Provincial laws so it depends on the jurisdiction.
>
> If the person is requesting accommodation it is the medical model approach to request "proof" of disability and possible recommendation from a medical practitioner to invoke the accommodation. Some entities may simply go with the Rights Holder model where if a person self identifies and states that they have a functional limitation and need a particular accommodation it is simply done.
>
> If person needs enlargement software use on PC the work place should grant the accommodation.
> If person needs to user copier on work time to enlarge documents in order to read them then it should be accommodated. During work hours
> Both of these accommodations have "no cost" and as such it seems that the fuss of medical proof of disability is not warranted. Especially if the business, since requesting the medical report could be billed for this cost.
>
> The question is what law governs this business Federal, Provincial, or State.
> If this is in the United States I do not know their statutes or laws or how the ADA or other laws may affect all of this.
>
> Robin East
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Visually Impaired Computer Users' Group List <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Jeanne Fike
> Sent: Friday, January 28, 2022 12:03 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: [VICUG-L] an eployer requesting a visually impaired imployee get an eye doctor letter to get accommodations at work
>
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> i,
> My visually impaired daughter works at a local hospital here in my city. She can do her job more efficiently and faster with Windows Magnifier on a computer rather than using a handheld magnifier to read the screen. My sighted husband who worked in It for a number of years said she should be given permission after logging in on a
> computer with her credentials to bring up Windows Magnifier.
> She can read paperwork faster if she could enlarge the print paperwork via a copier. He says she should be allowed to use a copier to do so before she starts her shift.
> Is it legal for her boss to request she have a letter from her eye doctor stating she needs these accommodations to do her job??
> Jeanne
>
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