DRCNH Home > Issue Areas > Employment > Truth About Accommodations

Reasonable accommodations are usually simple steps that allow employees with disabilities to perform their jobs.

• Most accommodations are not expensive:
• One-fifth of reasonable accommodations cost nothing (such as allowing an employee to take brief breaks in order to take medication).
• More than half of reasonable accommodations only cost between $1 and $500. The median cost is approximately $240.
• Some employees provide their own accommodations.
• Physical access as an accommodation is already required:
• Business such as stores and restaurants are already required to comply with physical access standards under the Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act in that such businesses are so-called “places of public accommodation.” Businesses routinely provide this access.
  
• Employers DO NOT have to do any of the following:

• remove or change a job's essential functions to accommodate the employee;
• lower production or performance standards;
• provide an employee with an adjustment that would assist the individual both on & off the job, such as a prosthetic limb, wheelchair, or eyeglasses;
• permit violations of rules of conduct necessary for the operation of the business

• Tax credits are available to offset the cost (usually minor) of providing reasonable accommodations when an undue burden does not exist.
• Reasonable Accommodation requirements would not apply to truly small businesses.
• As with all of the other New Hampshire anti-discrimination provisions, the law would only apply to businesses with six or more employees. Thus, it would not apply to truly small businesses.