Return-to-office mandates are becoming more common—and more enforceable—since a recent state court ruling reaffirmed a company’s authority to require that employees work from their desks.
In Castelino v. Whitman, Breed, Abbott & Morgan, the Connecticut Appellate Court ruled that employers don’t have to accommodate requests for full-time remote work if those arrangements would eliminate essential job functions.
According to legal experts, the July decision is the first appellate-level guidance in Connecticut on remote work accommodation requests following the pandemic.
It also gives guidance on issues where disability law and workplace flexibility overlap.
In June 2020, Marita Castelino, an administrative assistant at a Greenwich law firm, requested to work exclusively from home after learning COVID-19 testing was being conducted in her office building.
Castelino, who has diabetes and asthma, said she was told her position was “fully remote.”
Castelino was terminated two months later for performance issues.
Her lawsuit claimed disability discrimination, failure to accommodate, and retaliation.
Her employer denied the accommodation request, stating the role was “mostly” remote, but required some essential, in-person tasks such as finding physical files, obtaining signatures, and notarizing documents.
The Appellate Court affirmed a trial court decision in the law firm’s favor, ruling that working entirely remotely “was not a reasonable accommodation request, as a matter...
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