UPS in $2M settlement over disability policies

Suit: UPS discriminated against employees with disabilities.

UPS has agreed to pay $2 million to 88 current and former employees to resolve a disability discrimination lawsuit and to cover related administrative charges, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission said.

The EEOC filed the lawsuit in 2009, charging that Sandy Springsbased UPS did not provide reasonable accommodations to employees with disabilities to enable them to perform their jobs, in violation of federal law.

The EEOC also alleged that UPS fired disabled employees automatically after they reached 12 months of leave, and did not work individually with employees for reasonable accommodations as required by law.

The lawsuit was filed in federal court in Illinois over issues involving employees and former employees in the Chicago area.

The EEOC said UPS also agreed to update its accommodation policies and improve training for those who administer disability accommodation processes.

“UPS has now made changes which will allow more people to keep their jobs,” the EEOC Chicago district director, Julianne Bowman, said in a written statement.

The company said the settlement recognizes that it “has a robust ADA accommodation in place, along with one of the more generous and flexible leave policies in Corporate America.”