Employers, managers, and nonjudgmental people’s advice appreciated please.

[Anonymous 1]

I am looking for advice on reasonable accommodations requests for mental health issues.

A friend of mine has some mental health issues related to childhood trauma. With that comes some issues with the type of work he does but he also needs the job. My question is does anyone, know if this may be considered a reasonable request. He gets a 30 minute lunch and two ten minute breaks (one before lunch and one after). What he wants to do is ask his employer if it would be at all possible if he could take a 5 minute break before lunch, a five minute break after lunch followed by a 10 minute break after that (broken up of course). He gets extremely tired after lunch and it does affect his job performance. Breaking one break up would certainly help with that. He is also able and willing to provide documentation of his mental health diagnosis.

I’ve done some research about to ask for reasonable accommodations for that at work. I know that, by law, an employer cannot discriminate against employees for mental health issues. His employer is very understanding and works with any employee as best as they can.

Anyway, does the above scenario seem like it would be a reasonable accommodation request? He really needs to keep the job.

For the sake of privacy, I will not disclose the details of his job - but it involves a lot customer service skills which as anyone knows that has any experience with that knows that can be stressful to those without mental health problems - let alone someone with them. I worked customer service jobs myself for a long time.

I’d appreciate that judgmental comments be avoided on the post. If there are any, they will be ignored.

[highlandmum]

As a manager I would not have any issue with it. But I would tell the person that we will test it out on a trial basis and if it becomes a issue and starts to interfere with other employees we would have to reevaluate the situation, and work out another compromise.

Without understanding the workings of the company it is hard to determine if it would work. As do others have to cover for him during a break, does the company only allow one employee to take lunch/break at a time or is it a set lunch time. These are factors that need to be considered to see if the request would work.

[Olioxenfree]

Did he already disclose his mental health diagnosis? There’s two avenues. He can just ask and they can choose to allow him to do it, but that isn’t legally protected and they can change their mind at any time.

The best process would be to go through the Reasonable Accommodations for Employees with Disabilities process, which requires that he not only provide his diagnosis, he would need a doctor to prescribe that this accommodation is necessary. This would go to HR, not to his manager. He fills out one form, the doctor fills out one form, and then the manager fills out one form. The manager isn’t given information about his diagnosis, just the accommodation needed, and they sign off whether or not it would be completely impossible to accommodate or not based on what his job is. It’s more work, but I strongly suggest that he takes that route as it is the only way to provide legal protection. Otherwise his manager could just change their mind any time it isn’t convenient to them or he could get a new manager who says “we’re not doing that”, or another employee could make a complaint.

I’ve gone through this process both as the employee needing an accommodation and as a manager. The accommodation is a reasonable one, but to cover himself legally it’s important to get it covered.

[RIZZY]

I can't speak to the law but, depending on what he does for a living, it sounds perfectly reasonable. I mean, people who smoke get way more than a 30 minute lunch and 2 fifteen minute breaks. He isn't even asking for more, just different.

[AZOldGal66]

I think he should put his request in writing with a copy to his manager and whomever is the HR lead and explain in depth why this is a need for him.

I wish him the best and will be keeping my fingers crossed he's successful in this!!

[Baconqueen13]

I don't see why it would matter. He is taking the same amount of time he is just distributing it differently. His mental health shouldn't even be a factor in the decision IMO.

[PoplarGrove]

I'd be generally be the one fighting for employee requests and this is one would be a pretty easy one.

The only issue I could see is if the floor requires a certain number of people on it and scheduling other breaks might be difficult. The other option is...does he need the morning break? Asking to move two breaks to the afternoon could be a potentially easier fight than to shorten already short breaks.

[Traci_Momof2]

The biggest question to my mind is: when he takes a break, is the work of a nature that someone else literally has to step in while he is away? Or can he just walk away from his desk (or whatever setting) and then just resume work when he gets back? Because that will make the difference on just how difficult it is to accommodate. Because if someone has to be tracked down or scheduled in to step in for basically three different breaks as opposed to two different breaks, it could make it more difficult.

That doesn't mean he shouldn't ask. But he needs to be mindful when he asks as to how it's going to affect others, and already have solutions to offer if applicable. And he needs to go in with an 'asking' attitude, not a 'demanding' attitude.

[carterscutie85]

I have a reasonable accommodation at my job. It states that as long as I can do my job properly it can be accommodated. What your friend is asking is reasonable, however at my job it would not be possible most days because of how busy we are and short staffed we are. If they have plenty of coverage then I would say it's reasonable.