Employment Law Observer

On September 30, 2024, Chief Judge Laura Swain of the Southern District of New York, issued a ruling that a standalone website is not a place of public accommodation under Title III of the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA).

On April 15, 2024, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) published a Final Rule to implement regulations aimed at enforcing the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA).

On June 29, 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court issued Groff v. Dejoy, a ground-breaking decision that changes a long-recognized standard for religious accommodations in the workplace. This new interpretation effectively expands an employer's obligation to provide religious accommodations. For years, appellate courts recognized an employer's authority to reject a religious accommodation merely by showing it creates a de minimus burden on the employer or co-workers. With this decision, the Court rejected the routine application of the de minimus standard in favor of one where the employer must show the "accommodation would result in substantial increased costs in relation to the conduct of its particular business" if rejected. Now an employer must make an individualized assessment as to the impact of the accommodation, taking into account the employer’s nature, size, and resources. Even where the requested accommodation would result in substantially increased costs, the employer is obligated to evaluate the feasibility of alternative accommodations.

It just got harder to get out of working on the Sabbath on the basis of religion. The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit recently issued its opinion in Groff v. Dejoy, rejecting a mail carrier's repeated attempts to avoid working on Sundays due to his religious beliefs. The Court's opinion centered on the reasonableness of accommodations that would adjust an employee's work schedule for religious reasons and ultimately concluded that granting Groff's request for a blanket exemption from Sunday work would have placed an undue hardship on the United States Postal Service.