Editor’s note: The Back to Basics column serves as an accessible way to understand employment law. If you’re new to HR (or just need a little refresher), follow along as the HR Dive team speaks with legal experts, peruses federal guidance and lays out the basics of employment law. Feel free to send tips, questions and feedback to [email protected].
A hiring manager for a hotel chain is interviewing job candidates for a receptionist opening. As she opens the door to call the next candidate into the interview room, she notices that the candidate is using a wheelchair.
The manager assumes that the candidate may be using the wheelchair due to some kind of medical condition. Still, she knows that the Americans with Disabilities Act has strict rules regarding what questions employers may ask job candidates about their medical histories at various stages of the hiring process.
Navigating those restrictions can be tricky for HR departments, and it’s an area that employers “mess up all the time,” said Rachel Shaw, an ADA compliance consultant and president of Rachel Shaw, Inc. This is particularly the case after an offer of employment has been extended, but risks exist for each stage of the process, even post-hire.
To give newcomers to the profession a quick refresher of the ADA’s requirements, HR Dive asked Shaw to walk through a typical hiring decision.
If an employer has not yet given a conditional job offer to an...
The facts before the Third Circuit in the recently decided case of Patel v. United States illustrate how parties can put themselves in a bind if they make factual admissions when resolving a crimi...