Dollar General will pay $1 million to settle a lawsuit alleging it requested family medical history from job applicants, according to a Thursday announcement.
The employer, formally Dolgencorp, LLC, required applicants at its Bessemer, Alabama, distribution center to share past and present medical conditions of family members such as cancer, diabetes and heart disease, according to the 2017 U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission lawsuit (EEOC v. Dolgencorp, LLC).
It also required applicants to pass a post-offer, pre-employment medical exam that screened out qualified individuals with disabilities, the commission alleged, calling it “highly invasive.”
“For example,” the agency said in a statement, “Dollar General rescinded job offers to applicants whose blood pressure exceeded 160/100 or who had less than 20/50 vision in one eye, even when those impairments did not prevent the applicants from safely performing the job.”
Those actions ran afoul of both the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act, EEOC alleged in its lawsuit. It said it filed the claim on behalf of nearly 500 applicants who were required to report family medical history and another class of qualified applicants whose job offers were rescinded based on their impairments.
In addition to the monetary settlement, Dollar General agreed to provide annual training to all individuals involved in the hiring process on the ADA and GINA. Dollar General did not immediately return a request for comment.
GINA prohibits employers from discriminating against employees on the basis of genetic information, and also prohibits related questions. Likewise, the ADA sets strict limits on inquiries that amount to medical examinations at both the pre-offer and post-offer stages of hiring, and for those of employees.
While HR can work to ensure policies and procedures don’t run afoul of the law, manager training also can be crucial for GINA and ADA compliance, employment law attorneys have said: Managers often cause violations by asking invasive questions or retaliating against employees who exercise their rights.
