Who decides what reasonable adaptations are?

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And do you think these are reasonable?

Providing IT equipment, special desk and chair, and total cost £4000

Excusing employee from one task, which is usually about 20% of the workload for that role. It's a unpopular task and other team members would have to pick up the difference

3 x physio sessions pw in work time.

I'm asking because I'm part of the team and there has been some unrest. I'm fully supportive of the employer doing what they can to accomodate the disability and am very much "there but for the grace of God", but am genuinely unsure how much impact that should be allowed to have on the other staff. I'm sure employer will take advice, this is more for informal opinions.

FWIW colleague has recently joined and didn't disclose these issues (why should she?). It's not a new or worsening disability during the employment iyswim

but to be fair, your situation is highly unusual and actually sounds like incompetence from the NHS if you are seeing that many specialists on-goingly

Not incompetence at all. They are giving me excellent treatment.

The nature of my condition means that I need treatment from rheumatologists, gastroenterologists, physio, podiatrists, hand therapists, pain management, cardiology and haematology.

I only have one condition but it is affecting most systems in my body. Most of my treatment is aimed at keeping me as well as possible so that I can work and maintain my independence.

You sound like HR that I know - think it's within your remit to comment on medical treatment. I think that is best left to the doctors and HCP.

Sometimes it feels like disabled people are damned if they do, damned if they don’t.

Benefits for disabilities (both in Work and not) are incredibly hard to qualify for and we’re Work shy or faking if we get them.

But oh no, it’s not fair that we have rights in the workplace.

@Buggerbrexit

Exactly that.

Plus you have to get treatment to help you be well enough to work but also access that treatment outside of working hours, from the NHS that sees outpatients between 9-5 Mon - Fri.

And try to negotiate an NHS that no longer has all specialties at every hospital. So you now have to travel miles to receive treatment because your local hospital doesn't offer the treatment that you need. Then try to factor in 4 hours travel time, plus clinic time when I often wait an hour or more to be seen, into your working day too.

It's just impossible. It would be much easier for me not to work. Except that I would not be considered eligible for benefits because I'm not ill enough!!!!

But that’s generally not what happens, I can’t do heavy lifting but I don’t sit twiddling my thumbs while someone else does it. I either pick up what they were doing or do something else.

Access to work can also provide a lot of equipment and support (in the form of people) to help with this.

shocking to see someone suggest that the NHS aren't doing their jobs properly! google medical model vs social model. Disability is not something that can always be fixed! If you make adjustments and change attitudes then people won't be disabled at all hence the social model! If you don't understand what I mean, google it! They'll still have their impairment but they won't be disabled by it. So much ignorance and hate on this thread. Why won't MNHQ shut it down??

Sunshine, it’s better to let it stand and demonstrate that people don’t have a clue wrt equality.

@SputnikBear

I also do all aspects of my job - some I probably shouldn't do because they aggravate my condition but I am so afraid that I will be judged by others that I go out of my way to prove myself.

I also start work earlier and finish later than my colleagues. I also only take the breaks that I am entitled to.

Some of my colleagues are regularly late, pack up earlier than their finish time and regularly take longer on their break than they are entitled to. Many disappear for frequent smoking breaks or toilet breaks (which are just to have a chat or check their phones in truth).

So are you sure that every employee is actually working at 100% anyway? My view is that no they aren't.

It saddens me that people with disabilities are seen by so many on this thread as mainly burdens for employers, who shouldn't be entitled to fair treatment or seen as valued employees - or colleagues.

PP who mentioned old fashioned attitudes to pregnant women had a very good point.

I needed reasonable adjustments to do my job to the best of my ability. My bosses saw the benefit of them (including a higher absence rate) as it enabled me to be a valuable employee who more than earned her fees for the business despite needing assistance to do so effectively. Eventually I had to leave and my MD said to me then" you only remember all the times you weren't in the office and feel guilty, but all I remember were the times you were in the office and the effort you did make".

If you have a disability or not, which employer would you prefer to work for, someone who thinks like this, or someone who thinks "Being supportive of disabled people doesn't mean supporting them with a sense of entitlement above anyone else."? If you have a shit attitude towards staff with disabilities, they are still staff and all it means is you just have a shit attitude towards staff!

I did the very best job I could. Just because my legs didn't work as well, or my health wasn't as good, as the next person didn't change the fact I had qualifications, and network contacts and (without sounding boastful) useful skills. I still had value and would prefer to think I was useful, valued and beneficial to the business and people concentrated on the positives not the negatives.

It seems appropriate to post the illustration below as people get the point more than my rambling

Also, people do seem to grasp that it would be a reasonable adjustment for a company to spend money on, for example, installing a ramp for a wheelchair to enable someone to work for them.

Yet if you had someone who would do a really good job for 80% time of the time so the company had to pay for another 20% staff member, this would be seen as unreasonable.

Yet the second scenario probably would cost the business less and is no less of a reasonable adjustment for an asset to the business, disabled or not!

PP who mentioned old fashioned attitudes to pregnant women had a very good point
Those attitudes are alive and well. When I got pregnant (2016) my employer (school which employs on an annual rolling contract) took me aside and said they couldn’t employ me this year because I was too much of a liability. I could become long term sick and they couldn’t afford to pay me plus my replacement. There was nobody to cover my hospital appointments. There was no help available to carry heavy books or other equipment. I wouldn’t be able to leave my class unsupervised if I had morning sickness and needed to run to the bathroom. Etc. They said it wasn’t because they didn’t want to employ me, but they simply didn’t have the budget to cover my needs. When I got a solicitor they very quickly changed their tune and said admissions were down so they didn’t need as many teachers this year.

If adjustments are made, the company actually saves money long term, especially on avoiding discrimination claims!

Btw, that equality image isn't quite right. The third picture is what the ideal is. Going back to what I said about the social model.

All I really want by ways of reasonable adjustments are an adjustable chair and footstool. It would be fantastic if I could have some hospital appointments covered but I certainly don't expect it.

I'm tempted to pay for the chair and footstool myself except that I work for a billion pound company who can afford it much more than I can and other staff would be using it when I'm not there which will mean it will either go missing or get broken so why should I have to pay for it?

HR professional but not an experienced, award winning equalities professional? I took HR "professionals" like yourself to court and won. You don't win simply for being a 'pain in the arse', you lose for being an ignorant insensitive dismissive HR "professional".

I haven’t lost a tribunal in the 15 years I’ve been practicing. No awards for that, sadly.

This is a good document that explains disability leave as being a reasonable adjustment and examples of legal action being taken

I didn’t say it couldn’t be a reasonable adjustment. It would be good practice. Just that not all employers could accommodate it as such, nor would they be required to.

But don’t let what I actually said get in the way of what you think I said, eh?

Feel free to PM me the case details that you’re talking about and I’ll look it up on the tribunal database. Let’s see what actually happened, shall we?

Sunshine thank you, I knew my image wasn't quite the right one!

As a DSE Assessor I'm really shocked by some of the attitudes on this thread. As someone with a selection of disabilities I'm not really surprised.

I've arranged specialist chairs for people with bad backs (is that a disability?), specialist mice for people with arthritis or RSI, specialist monitors for people with sight problems, specialist software for dyslexics. Perfectly reasonable adjustments for people to be able to do their jobs.

I agree with PPs who explained about NHS clinics. Luckily my oncologist always gives me an appointment for about 4pm, and invariably I'm still waiting to be seen at 5.45 when the nursing staff are packing up to go home, but at least it's in my own time.

My MH appointments are always either at 10am or 1pm so I'm a bit stuck there. Even worse the clinic is across the river the other side of the city and a bugger to get to. Luckily we have flexitime and people are in and out all day long so I don't think my colleagues are getting together to gripe that I've had another morning off. Maybe they are?

Weasel, sadly I’m not surprised by some of the attitudes at all.

The thing that really galls me about these attitudes is that actually I am a Really High Performer. So if I can actually get the damned job I’ll be perfectly good at it - if I’m allowed to work from home when I’m ill, don’t have unmanageable travel requirements imposed. It would be a total waste for me to be unable to do my job because there were no reasonable adjustments.

The simple answer to the question in the title is that a court, or rather an employment tribunal, decides.

Having partially won a tribunal on some similar issues about medical appointments etc., I know that the answer is that reasonable is a massive grey area.

I think the answer is also different depending on the business's size, resources, policies etc.

Occupational Health recommendations are key.

But my experience is that appointments should be allowed but not necessarily paid. Time could be made up later.

I wanted to reply to this thread but had to leave it a few days so I could reply a little more calmly.

Disabled people don’t declare their disabilities at interview for many reasons, including the need to let the employer pick the best person for the job. That’s who they pick, yeah? The best person to do the job? Who may or may not turn out to have a legal right to get reasonable adjustments. Telling the employer before that puts them in an awkward position as they don’t want that knowledge when deciding who to hire, any more than they want to know someone’s sexuality.

As to it being unfair, look, I really can muster some empathy for people who feel they’re being inconvenienced, but do you know why they feel like that? Not because it’s unfair for disabled people to get accommodations, but because it’s being handled badly by managers who are not adequately managing the situation. On this occasion you should be shooting the messenger. And disabled people don’t have a life that’s as easy as yours, just with some extra special treatment at work. We have a life with difficulties caused by a disability or disabilities. Of course as an outsider you might just see the things you feel are an unfair disadvantage, but that’s unlikely to be the whole story.

Nobody wins when someone who is really good at their job either has to use more of their leave for medical appointments than a non-disabled person or take unpaid leave. But the situation is especially doomed to fail when managers do stuff like involve other colleagues in discussions that frame the disabled person’s legal rights as an inconvenience. The people who should be in this conversation are managers, HR and occupational health, and your manager/s should be thinking more carefully about how not to make other staff feel resentful.

Is it fair that people with long-term problems have more rights? Well, maybe don’t start there. Ask yourself if it’s fair that we have these problems to deal with. What do you want us to do? Not work?

I am extremely good at my job and I also have some accommodations including not doing two small duties. My managers did not bungle this, so my colleagues don’t have an issue. Your beer here is not with your colleague. And it’s not up to you to decide how many medical problems is enough, or that accommodations are unfair - they don’t just have the accommodations, they also have the difficulties that go with it.

Is it fair that other people with passing issues get less help? Again, your beef is with your employer not with the unfairness of people daring to have disabilities for longer.

You are misquoting me! I said “disabled people don’t have a life that’s as easy as yours, just with some extra special treatment at work”.

I’m sorry about your friend but she may be entitled to certain things due to being a carer. But none of this is about having problems - it’s about needing adjustments IN THE WORKPLACE to be able to do your job. What part of that are you not able to grasp?

Do you think it’s unfair that blind people need guide dogs or people who can’t walk need wheelchairs? Or do you only object to adjustments you think you would also like to have?

@swingofthings
That sounds very difficult for your friend.

She may be eligible for carers leave or if she feels that she can't manage her GP could sign her off work.

What you need to remember though is having a disability doesn't male you immune to the stresses of every day life. I still have to cope with children being ill, parents being ill, me having normal illnesses etc. It's that much mire difficult when you are trying to get time off for all of this against a background of disability.

That's why adjustments are important. They are meant to level the playing field so that no one is disadvantaged because of disability. It's not meant as a protection against all ills.

Wombles vat no time ha e I said that I didn't think special arrangements should be made for disabled people. It is not in my mindset at all to not help anyone to give them a chance to perform their duty as best as they can.

The point is that this should apply to anyone's who struggle not just disabled people. Disabled people don't have the monopoly in being faced with difficulties that makes working difficult. What is important is that disabled people shouldn't be treated with any less considerations.

The issue, going back to the original question is what can be deemed to be reasonable and my view is what is reasonable is what should apply to anyone to needs extra support to perform their job.

BPT, my friend doesn't want to be signed off and rightly so, why should she be, she's not ill. She has taken some carers leave days to go to her mum and deal with carers but what she could really do with is being able to take a few hours leave there and then which she can't really do.

Of course disabled people can have a stressful life too, but that is my point, it's not a competition, what is reasonable for one person should be for another depending on their actual need, not whether their condition fall under a certain definition or not.

By the way, I have become close friend with a disable person I used to manage so I can't be that bad but I never saw her as a disabled person which she liked I treated her like the others in the team. She did need to go to some appointments but always mentioned it in advance and worked out how she could make up the time. Similarly I had no issue letting people go to their kids performance or distant relatives funeral as long as they arranged cover with the rest of the team and made up their time.