Atlanta, GA asked in Employment Law for Georgia

Q: Is a job allowed to deny an employee the ability to work from home when the employee is undergoing chemotherapy?

The employee has been with the company for 2.5 years, its an outbound call center job. The reason for working at home is because the doctor requires the person to recover for at least 3-5 days. The job is denying me this, I have FMLA already but this is shorting my pay when the person may need to take a sick day to relax. Can you please give me some options so I can bring this to the employer. Thank you in advance.

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2 Lawyer Answers
Mitchell Feldman
PREMIUM
Mitchell Feldman
Answered
  • Tampa, FL
  • Licensed in Georgia

A: Arguably you are suffering from a disability with a cancer diagnosis. So then your employer should engage you in a discussion and interactive process in attempting to accommodate the work restriction. If they have a legitimate business reason why you cannot work from home, then they don't have to let you work from home. If other people work from home, doing the same job, then likely they should accommodate this.

See if you can work it out with HR, and if not, you should consult a lawyer.

Dawn L. Richards
Dawn L. Richards
Answered
  • Jupiter, FL
  • Licensed in Georgia

A: If your employer employs 15 or more employees they are required to provide reasonable accommodation for an employee with a disability. Depending upon the nature of the industry and the type of work you do, work from home may or may not be reasonable.

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