Who Is Covered
Title I of the ADA applies to employers with 15 or more employees, including state and local governments, employment agencies, and labor organizations.
It protects "qualified individuals with disabilities"— people who can perform the essential functions of the job with or without reasonable accommodation.
Title I covers all aspects of employment: hiring, firing, promotions, pay, training, benefits, and all other terms and conditions of employment. From the moment you apply for a job to the day you leave, ADA protections apply.
Official Standard
42 U.S.C. §12112(a) — General Rule
"No covered entity shall discriminate against a qualified individual on the basis of disability in regard to job application procedures, the hiring, advancement, or discharge of employees, employee compensation, job training, and other terms, conditions, and privileges of employment."
What Is a Reasonable Accommodation?
A reasonable accommodation is a modification or adjustment to the job application process, work environment, or the way a job is performed that enables a person with a disability to have equal employment opportunities.
Common examples include:
- Modified work schedules or flexible hours
- Reassignment to a vacant position
- Accessible office furniture or ergonomic equipment
- Screen readers or other assistive technology
- Sign language interpreters for meetings
- Telework or remote work arrangements
- Modified training materials or testing formats
42 U.S.C. §12112(b)(5)(A)
Employers are not required to provide an accommodation that would cause "undue hardship"— significant difficulty or expense relative to the employer's size, financial resources, and the nature of its operations.
Official Standard
42 U.S.C. §12111(9) — Definition
"The term 'reasonable accommodation' may include — (A) making existing facilities used by employees readily accessible to and usable by individuals with disabilities; and (B) job restructuring, part-time or modified work schedules, reassignment to a vacant position, acquisition or modification of equipment or devices, appropriate adjustment or modifications of examinations, training materials or policies, the provision of qualified readers or interpreters, and other similar accommodations."
The Interactive Process
The accommodation process is a collaborative dialogue between the employee and employer. Here's how it typically works:
What Employers Cannot Do
Title I includes specific prohibitions on employer conduct. Employers cannot:
- Ask about disabilities before a job offer — pre-offer inquiries about medical conditions, disability status, or workers' compensation history are prohibited.
- Require medical exams before a conditional offer — post-offer medical exams are permitted only if required for all employees in the same job category.
- Retaliate against employees who request an accommodation, file a complaint, or participate in an investigation.
- Use qualification standards that screen out people with disabilities unless those standards are job-related and consistent with business necessity.
- Refuse to hire a qualified candidate because of the cost of providing a reasonable accommodation.
Important
These protections apply throughout the entire employment relationship — from the application process through termination and post-employment references.
Filing a Title I Complaint
Employment discrimination complaints under the ADA are filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), not the Department of Justice.
You can file a charge online, by mail, or in person at any EEOC field office. Visit eeoc.gov/filing-charge-discrimination for detailed instructions.
Important Note
This guide provides general information about ADA employment protections. For advice about your specific situation, consult with an employment attorney experienced in disability discrimination law.
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What counts as an ADA employment issue
If something happened at work and you think disability played a part, the first question is whether Title I applies at all. It generally covers employers with 15 or more employees, including hiring, firing, pay, promotions, training and benefits.
From there, it depends on the facts: what was asked for, what the employer said, and whether the job's essential functions were still met with or without an accommodation. This guide can help you understand the rule. It can't tell you what happened in your situation means for you, and nothing here is a legal conclusion about your job.
Signs worth looking at closely
A few patterns often come up when people ask about Title I:
- A request for accommodation was ignored, delayed for a long time, or refused without any explanation of undue hardship
- Discipline, demotion or firing followed soon after disclosing a disability or asking for an accommodation
- A job offer was withdrawn after a medical exam or disability-related question
- Questions about disability came up in hiring before a conditional offer was made
None of these automatically mean the law was broken. They're just the kinds of facts that tend to matter, which is why the interactive process below exists: to work out, case by case, what's reasonable.
If you've hit one of these at work
You have a few options, and they're not mutually exclusive:
- Ask your employer, in writing, to restart or document the interactive process
- Look up how filing a complaint works in the Standards Guide
- Talk through what happened with an ADA attorney, who can look at the specific facts and tell you what your options are
We can't review your employment situation or tell you what the outcome would be. An attorney who reviews the specific facts is the only one who can do that.
Keep reading the Standards Guide
This page covers who's protected, what accommodation means, and how the interactive process generally works. For the full picture of how the ADA treats the built environment, complaints, and other titles, go back to the ADA Standards Guide.