Labor and Employment Law
Western Governors University
LIT1 310.1.5-02,11,13
February 6, 2012
Course Mentor: Quinn Hanamaikai

Task A: Evaluation of the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 as applied to situation A. A1? Has a violation occurred in situation A?
To qualify for The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), an employee or family member must suffer from an illness which is a chronic condition, a long term condition, hospitalization, a condition that requires ongoing treatment or have a pregnancy, parental complications or the adoption of a child.
There are also many restrictions to qualify for FMLA. The employee in situation A has worked for the company for two years which meets the 12 month/1,250 hours worked in previous year requirement. As the employee’s spouse recently gave birth to twins, he is eligible for FMLA leave of 12 weeks under the Parental leave requirements. Both women and men can take parental leave under FMLA leave after the birth of a child. Any time within the first year after the child is born FMLA leave can be taken. Smaller companies are not required to give FMLA leave to their employees as it would be an undue strain. As Employee A had his FMLA leave request approved the company complied with FMLA as it has more than 50 employees within 75 miles of the workplace.
Employee A has asked to return to work after 11 weeks of being on leave, and, and he is requesting to be compensated with pay for the 11 weeks that was withheld during his leave. The department manager who left the company during Employee A’s leave has no effect on this situation as the new manager has agreed to the return of Employee A’s previous job, at the previous amount of pay. The manager has declined the 11 weeks of withheld salary that was requested by employee A.
A1? This is not a violation of FMLA as employers are not legally required to provide paid leave for FMLA leave but the employee could have taken any accrued paid time off like vacation or sick leave which was not the situation in this case.
If the previous manager told employee A that he would be paid for his leave under FMLA, the previous manager was incorrect and there would be little recourse for employee A if this was not in writing. Depending on the company, they could provide this as an extra benefit however; in this case this was not a benefit the company offered.

Task B: Examination of situation B regarding the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA).
B1? Has a violation occurred in situation B?

The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 or the ADEA, was enacted by Congress because older workers were being disadvantaged in their efforts to obtain and retain employment. The ADEA states that people applying and employees 40 or older are protected from discrimination based on their age. They also have protection regarding insurance benefits and retirement discrimination based on age. In situation B, employee B is 68 years old which gives him protection under ADEA from discrimination based on age regarding promotion, compensation, disciplining or hiring or termination.

In situation B, employee B was passed over for a promotion to a coworker who was 32 who received a lower ranking on a recent performance review. This could be a violation of the ADEA if there we no other factors involved with determining the promotion of the younger employee. Based on the information in Situation B, a violation has transpired of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967.

If there had been multiple prior evaluations where the 32 year old employee had high marks and the 62 year old employee B had poor marks, and that was taken into account, or if the younger employee had recently completed additional educational or training seminars that could help them do the job better, this might not be considered an age discrimination issue.

Task C:

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) prohibits discrimination in employment based on a disability. Also prohibited are discrimination in public accommodations and commercial facilities. Additionally, transportation and telecommunications are also covered on the basis of a disability. To be protected under ADA, a person must have a disability which according to the ADA is any person which has a mental or physical affliction that limits one or more major life activities extensively, a person who has a history or record of such an impairment, or a person who is perceived by others as having such an impairment (A Guide to Disability Rights Laws, 2005).

The ADA also requires that reasonable accommodations are made for employees with disabilities unless it would result in an undue hardship to the employer. In situation C, the company X told the applicant C that they were not hired because company X would be subjected to an undue hardship if they had to lower the elevator key pads in two of the elevators to accommodate applicant C if hired. In this situation, applicant C could have performed all the duties required for the position and depending on what the costs would be to relocate the keypads in two of the elevators, a case could be made that given the size of the company, this would not be an undue hardship and would be a reasonable accommodation.

I believe that based on the situation described, and given the ADA requirements, this could be considered a violation and company X should look into this further to determine if the costs of moving these keypads would be an undue burden to the company. If the cost to transfer these keypads was at a high cost and considered an undue burden, then this situation would not be a violation of the ADA.

References
Unknown Author, September 2015. A Guide to Disability Rights Laws (online course material). U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, Disability Rights Section