The duty on employers to make reasonable adjustments for disabled employees, under the Equality Act 2010, applies to job applicants as well as employees.
This obligation only applies where the employer:
Mr Mallon had dyspraxia. He applied for a role with AECOM and was required, as part of the online application process, to complete a personal profile.
Mr Mallon emailed AECOM his CV which confirmed that he had dyspraxia and cited how dyspraxia affected people generally. He asked to be able to make an oral application because of his disability.
AECOM responded to say that he needed to complete the online form but that he was to let them know if he was particularly struggling with any part of it.
Instead of specifically explaining why this was a struggle for him (he could not create a username or password to access the form), he simply told AECOM, again, that he would prefer to do the form over the phone and make an oral application.
Mr Mallon’s request was not granted as he had not provided AECOM with the specific information that they asked him to. Therefore, he brought a disability discrimination claim, citing that AECOM had failed to make reasonable adjustments.
The claim was upheld, and Mr Mallon was awarded £2700.
The full judgement can be read here on the GOV website.
The Tribunal’s findings offer employers guidance as follows:
This case shows how important it is for employers to have solid processes in place for dealing with issues that arise during recruitment, especially when it comes to making adjustments to the process for disabled applicants.
This case also touched on whether or not Mr Mallon was actually a genuine applicant (he had brought about 60 claims against recruiters or potential employers relating to their recruitment exercises) and his motives had been questioned during those other proceedings – that is another possible defence for employers.
However, in this case, it did not stop this claim from being successful and highlights the importance of: