On July 26, 2023, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) released a technical assistance document titled “Visual Disabilities in the Workplace and the Americans with Disabilities Act.” This guidance explains how the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) applies to job applicants and employees with visual disabilities.

The new guidance is part of a Q & A series addressing how the ADA applies to particular disabilities in the workplace. It outlines such topics as when an employer may ask an applicant or employee questions about their vision, how an employer should treat voluntary disclosures about visual disabilities, and what types of reasonable accommodations those with visual disabilities may need in the workplace.

Proper Questioning Surrounding Employers with Vision Impairments

The guidance makes clear that “not everyone who wears glasses is an individual with a disability under the ADA.” Instead, when deciding if someone with a vision impairment who uses (or used, in the case of a past impairment) “ordinary eyeglasses or contact lenses” is an individual with an “actual” or “record of” a disability, the guidance instructs that an employee’s impairment should be assessed as it is corrected by the lenses. If using ordinary lenses results in no substantial limitation to a major life activity, then a person’s vision impairment does not constitute a disability under the ADA’s definitions of “actual” or “record of” a disability.

The guidance provides that...

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