Employers need to be aware of the changes to the ADA that the new ADA Amendments Act puts into place effective January 1, 2009.
The ADA Amendments Act of 2008, signed by President Bush on September 25, 2008, came about from members of Congress disagreeing with key Supreme Court rulings defining “disability”. The amendments will overturn these prior court cases broadening the definition of disability and increasing the number of employees to be covered. The amendment restricts the ability to determine disability based on ameliorative effects of mitigating measures. Impairments that are episodic or in remission will now also be seen as a disability if it limits a major life activity when active. Congress in addition ordered the EEOC to issue new regulations on when an individual is “substantially limited”. On the plus side Congress has outlawed reverse discrimination suits.
The changes to the ADA will now make many more employees qualified as disabled. Employers will need to spend more time on determining reasonable accommodations than on whether the employee is disabled. HR policies and procedures will need to be updated and competent professional assistance should be procured.
See Also
- EEOC Notice Concerning the ADA Amendments Act of 2008
ADA Amendments
At issue are rules that went into effect in August that spell out which workers get overtime pay, commonly known as time-and-a-half free host, for working more than 40 hours a week. The new rules affect salaried “white-collar” jobs, such as health-care workers, sales managers and department supervisors web design services. Traditional “blue-collar” jobs, such as construction workers, mechanics and workers covered by union contracts are not affected by the new rules. Public-sector employees, who typically are covered by union contracts search engine marketing services, also largely will not be affected by the rules.
The Bush administration issued the new rules to help stave off the flurry of lawsuits from workers suing their companies for overtime work at home. Businesses as varied as Wal-Mart and Taco Bell have been slapped with multi-million-dollar judgments because of overtime irregularities.
Nearly everyone agrees that the federal rules, originally written during the Great Depression when hourly manufacturing jobs dominated the U.S. economy, were long overdue for a rewrite. But that’s where the agreement pretty much ends.
Supporters of the rule, including business groups, say the new requirements from the Bush administration’s Department of Labor will help 6.7 million workers get paid time-and-half if they work more than 40 hours a week while opponents, such as organized labor, say the rules could cost 6 million workers extra overtime pay.