April 09, 2025
Oh, My Aching Feet! An ADA Lawsuit?
Yep! An employer required its cocktail servers to wear black high heels as part of their uniform. One server asked to wear low-heeled shoes. After several requests, the employer requested a doctor’s note. The employee’s health care practitioner wrote that the employee had “Equinus Deformity” and “Achillis Tendinitis,” should “avoid heels” and “wear good supportive shoes” to aid her in performing her job duties. The employer granted the request for the employee to “wear flats/good support shoes instead of heels.” So, what’s the problem?
Sometime later the employer advised the employee she was not wearing the proper kind of low-heeled shoe. It published a memo to servers reminding them that slipper-type shoes and sneakers were not acceptable and included a description of three non-heeled shoes that employee could wear for ADA accommodations. Still sound OK?
Two months after sending out the memo, the employer issued corrective action to the employee because she continued to wear the non-approved shoes. She then provided another note from her doctor ask that she be permitted to wear the “previously approved” soft-top shoe. The employer denied that the soft-top shoe was previously approved and declined the request. The next month the employee was fired for “violating the company’s appearance standards.” Ah, now we see the potential problem.
In short, the court found the “evidence is conflicting” as to what happened when. Because of that, it denied the employer’s request for summary judgment and the case now goes to trial.
Lessons learned. Let business needs drive your employment decisions. We read cases related to an employer’s failure to provide reasonable accommodation for disability, religion, and pregnancy. A question employers may want to ask as they consider these requests is, “So what?” How will the requested accommodation adversely impact your business operations? Will customer walk out if the see a server in soft-top rather than hard-top shoes? Will the company lose revenue? Is it a safety hazard? Without a bona fide business reason that is job-related and consistent with business necessity (a phrase regularly used by the EEOC), talk to your company’s legal counsel and consider granting the request.
