Enforcement Guidance: Reasonable Accommodation and Undue Hardship Under the Americans with Disabilities Act
Undue Hardship
The only statutory limitation on an employer's obligation to provide "reasonable accommodation" is that no such change or modification is required if it would cause "undue hardship" to the employer.(16) "Undue hardship" means significant difficulty or expense and focuses on the resources and circumstances of the particular employer in relationship to the cost or difficulty of providing a specific accommodation. Undue hardship refers not only to financial difficulty, but to reasonable accommodations that are unduly extensive, substantial, or disruptive, or those that would fundamentally alter the nature or operation of the business.(17) An employer must assess on a case-by-case basis whether a particular reasonable accommodation would cause undue hardship. The ADA's "undue hardship" standard is different from that applied by courts under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for religious accommodation.(18)
16. See 42 U.S.C. § 12112 (b)(5)(A) (1994) (it is a form of discrimination to fail to provide a reasonable accommodation "unless such covered entity can demonstrate that the accommodation would impose an undue hardship . . ."); see also 42 U.S.C.
§ 12111(10) (1994) (defining "undue hardship" based on factors assessing cost and difficulty).
The legislative history discusses financial, administrative, and operational limitations on providing reasonable accommodations only in the context of defining "undue hardship." Compare Senate Report, supra note 6, at 31-34 with 35-36; House Education and Labor Report, supra note 6, at 57-58 with 67-70.
17. See 42 U.S.C. § 12111(10) (1994); 29 C.F.R. § 1630.2(p) (1997); 29 C.F.R. pt. 1630 app. § 1630.2(p) (1997).
18. See 29 C.F.R. pt. 1630 app. § 1630.15(d) (1997). See also Eckles v. Consolidated Rail Corp., 94 F.3d 1041, 1048-49, 5 AD Cas. (BNA) 1367, 1372-73 (7th Cir. 1996); Bryant v. Better Business Bureau of Maryland, 923 F. Supp. 720, 740, 5 AD Cas. (BNA) 625, 638 (D. Md. 1996).
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