Although simply keeping an employee away from work is an easy route to wait till he/she recovers, and the employer might have the best intentions of protecting an employee, and encouraging the disabled worker to recover sooner than later by taking time off, consider as situation where that employee's disability or limitation will last indefinitely or will be permanent. If that employee is place on so-call involuntarily medical leave, he will be effectively terminated, since he will have to stay on leave as long as he is disabled, or - forever. This is pretty much equivalent to a wrongful termination based on disability discrimination.
Consider a situation where an employee has a certain disability or medical condition that prevents him/her from performing a few of the many job duties, without affecting his ability to perform many other job duties. That employees is likely entitled to reasonable accommodations. Some employer, however, choose to "play it safe" placing that kind of employee on "involuntary illness leave". This however is likely to be illegal and is tantamount to suspension without leave (Bostean v. Los Angeles Unified School District), and can be considered a disability discrimination under ADA and FEHA.
Although simply keeping an employee away from work is an easy route to wait till he/she recovers, and the employer might have the best intentions of protecting an employee, and encouraging the disabled worker to recover sooner than later by taking time off, consider as situation where that employee's disability or limitation will last indefinitely or will be permanent. If that employee is place on so-call involuntarily medical leave, he will be effectively terminated, since he will have to stay on leave as long as he is disabled, or - forever. This is pretty much equivalent to a wrongful termination based on disability discrimination.
1 Comment
4/27/2023 04:29:13 pm
Living with a disability sounds really difficult. My wife and I need to get a disability plan for our son. He has cerebral palsy.
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