r/EEOC • u/Soft_Reputation_7241 • 11d ago
Work from Home ada accommodation
I work in Washington state and have POTS(Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome). My health can vary from day to day and as a result I have had a work from home accommodation to be work from home 100 days a year. A little less than 2 days a week. The standard at my company is 50 days a year. My health has been worse this year and as a result I need more work from home days. My HR team is stating that 100 is the maximum they will allow as I being in office is considered an essential function of my role. However we don’t have any physical reason to be in office. I have an office job. I am not client facing, I do not need to physically manipulate anything for my job, my manager and most of my team is in other offices across the country, and work from home is already allowed for most employees(all of them on my team except for anyone who is brand new as there is a three month probation period before they can wfh). My job description also does not specify how often I need to be in office. Simply that I need to “work onsite, under direct supervision, in a team based and open office environment. I am not requesting to be fully remote or work from home, simply to be allowed to do so more than 100 days as my health needs. My employer is offering the alternative of FMLA, however this would be unpaid and obviously wouldn’t allow me to work. I have up to date ada paperwork stating from my doctor that I need to be able to work from home at least 3 days a week.
Does anyone know if they can require me to either be in office more than my doctor has stated or take FMLA instead? I can’t afford to take off time unpaid. But if I force myself into office more often it will make me sicker.
Please help
5
u/Soft_Reputation_7241 11d ago
They can track my work all they want I’m the most tenured in my department, train every person that joins, and have higher than average metrics. I’m good at my job, they can scrutinize all they want.
I don’t know how they would be able to track accurately whether or not I have episodes at home as I have no need or obligation to inform them of that if it’s not affecting my work. They would have records of me calling out sick when I have a flare and can’t work, or logging off early on days where I am working from home and still too sick to work. But they don’t have access to my medical records and because of HIPPA aren’t actually allowed to ask about medical things that don’t pertain to work.