EEOC Sues Celadon Over Disqualifying Drivers for Disabilities Found During Physical Exams

This story appears in the March 12 print edition of Transport Topics.

Celadon Trucking Services Inc.’s practice requiring pre-employment physical exams for drivers is the subject of a new lawsuit, in which the federal government said the exams violate a federal law prohibiting discrimination related to certain disabilities.

Celadon “unlawfully subjected applicants to medical examinations and failed to hire qualified applicants because of disabilities or perceived ones,” the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission said in a statement announcing the lawsuit it filed Feb. 29 in a federal court in Indianapolis, where the truckload carrier is headquartered.

EEOC said that the physicals were inconsistent with Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration standards for screening truck drivers to see if they are fit to drive. Furthermore, Celadon rejected applicants who were physically qualified under FMCSA regulations, in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act, EEOC said.

ADA, first enacted in 1990, prohibits employers from discriminating against applicants if they have certain disabilities. It also prohibits employers from requiring an applicant to have a physical exam as a condition for a job offer, EEOC said.

“We’re not doing anything different from anybody else,” Paul Will, president of Celadon, told Transport Topics in response to EEOC’s allegations. Celadon uses a local hospital to conduct the physicals, which abide by FMCSA guidelines and are meant only to screen for conditions that make a driver ineligible to drive, he said.

“We have to follow [Department of Transportation] guidelines,” Will said, “because if that driver hits someone or does something, and we let him drive even though he didn’t meet his qualifications for the DOT, we’d be sued.”

Celadon did deny employment to the drivers EEOC cited in its lawsuit, but none of them met FMCSA medical standards, Will said. The carrier asked those applicants to seek proper treatment for their conditions, such as a hearing aid for hard-of-hearing applicants, and said it would hire the applicants who get the proper treatment, Will said.

“A driver comes in, you tell them ‘you need go out and get this done.’ And then they just never come back,” Will said.

“Under the ADA, an employer cannot conduct a medical examination of a job applicant until the employer  has given the applicant a job offer conditioned upon the applicant passing the examination,” Laurie Young, an Indianapolis-based EEOC attorney, said in the statement.

In its lawsuit, EEOC named 16 applicants who it said were wrongly rejected for employment. The 16 applicants represent a class of drivers who EEOC said were denied jobs.

EEOC provided four examples of drivers in its lawsuit, three of whom had hearing loss, while one had deep venous thrombosis. Each of the applicants was fully qualified to drive a truck, the agency said.

“The effect of the policy and practices . . . has been to deprive a class of truck drivers of equal employment opportunities and otherwise adversely affect their ability to become employed with defendant and/or other motor carriers,” the lawsuit said.

Celadon did reject applicants who had trouble hearing, as their level of hearing did not meet FMCSA standards, Will said. The examiners testing the drivers instructed them to get hearing aids and did not certify them as eligible to drive.

“All they have to do is get a hearing aid,” Will said. But applicants often do not come back to Celadon after that.

In the case of the driver with deep venous thrombosis, he had been prescribed a blood thinner to treat it, but said he was not taking it regularly. Without proper treatment, the disease can cause sudden strokes, and it disqualifies a driver under federal standards, Will said.

“Like most trucking companies, we will hire anyone that meets the DOT requirements,” Will said.

EEOC differentiated between the physicals that Celadon required before it made a job offer and extending a job offer, but making the physical a condition of the offer. The first is illegal, but the second is legal, the agency said in its statement.

Will said he has asked American Trucking Associations’ Litigation Center to assist Celadon in defending the case, since the practices EEOC alleged are common in the trucking industry. ATA declined to comment.