Raleigh company under fire from EEOC

The U.S. Equal Opportunity Commission (EEOC) investigates charges alleging violations of the federal employment discrimination statutes. In most cases, the probe will result in the dismissal of the charge and the issuance of a right-to-sue notice, which allows the charging employees to act on their own to file a lawsuit. In other cases, however, the investigation will lead to a “cause” determination that some form of discrimination has occurred, and the agency must pursue conciliation discussions (i.e., seek an agreement from the employer to pay money to the employee and revise its policy or training requirements). If conciliation fails, the EEOC must then decide whether to issue a right-to-sue notice to the individual or actually file a lawsuit with the agency as the suing party. It recently made the latter decision to pursue a North Carolina employer in court.

EEOC lawsuit alleges ADA violations

A company named NSN provides staffing for a licensing and vocational testing center in Raleigh. In its lawsuit, the EEOC alleges the firm violated federal law by failing to accommodate an employee’s disability and then retaliating against her.

According to the EEOC’s lawsuit, the employee worked as a part-time administrator in the Raleigh testing center from 2016 until she was fired on January 9, 2020. The agency alleges that after she was hired, NSN granted her certain reasonable accommodations for a disability. The accommodations remained in place until the fall of 2019, when there was a change in supervision. The new supervisor rescinded some of the previously granted accommodations.