All that for a bag of chips: Walgreens pays $180K to settle ADA claim

A few months ago, I blogged about a California federal court decision, which recognized that Walgreens may have an obligation under the Americans with Disabilities Act to accommodate one of its cashiers who opened a $1.39 bag of chips (without having paid for it first) because she was suffering from an attack of hypoglycemia (low blood sugar).

That post was entitled “The ADA may require companies to accommodate employee theft. Yep, stealing.“

Unfortunately, definitive guidance on that will have to spring from another lawsuit. That is, Walgreens settled for $180,000 last week. A copy of the consent decree is embedded below (and can also be found here).

Now, I’m reasonably sure that Walgreens is right that employee theft is not a reasonable accommodation for an ADA disability. And let’s assume that Walgreens has strict rules on employee theft and grazing.

But would failing to discipline this cashier really blow the lid off of Pandora’s Box? Or did a Supervisor / HR Manager / Lawyer (some combination) simply overreact by failing to cut some slack to a diabetic employee who needed to eat a small bag of potato chips — I’ll draw the line at a can of Pringles — to avoid a low blood sugar attack?

You know, it’s important to train your managers how to address ADA accommodation issues. It’s also important to remind your managers that using their best judgment counts for something too.

Who knows? It may only cost you $1.39, instead of $180,000.