News & Insights

Employment Tribunal finds that forcing an employee to keep camera on is disability discrimination

An Employment Tribunal (ET) has recently held that Holiday Extras failed to make a reasonable adjusmtent by asking a fully remote travel consultant, Ms Laura Tait, to keep her camera on during an online meeting.

Ms Tait's anxiety led to a series of absences from work, and she had informed various managers of her working preferences in order to manage these symptoms. These adjustments were not put in place. During a remote training session, she asked if she could keep the camera off as keeping it on made her feel anxious. She was told to start with the camera on, and see how she felt. Over the course of the session, her anxiety grew to such a level where she had asked to leave, which she was allowed to do. 

While this wasn’t the only event that led the ET ruling that she was subject to disability discrimination, they did state that company should have allowed her to leave her camera off as they were aware of the effect this had on her anxiety.

Does this mean that companies should be wary of implementing ‘camera on’ policies?

Our partner Hina Belitz says that this would be too much of a blanket statement to make: ‘Requiring that employees keep their cameras on, especially if they work largely remotely, can be beneficial for employers, and I doubt the intention of the Tribunal was to go against that. In today’s age where in-person meetings are becoming rarer in favour of Teams or Zoom, we may even have colleagues who we have never physically met in person. Employees build rapport by being able to see one another, and also better understand each other’s tone of voice when emails can come across as far too stiff.’

Yet this case should still be a learning lesson for employers. ‘The mistake that this employer made,’ Hina says, ‘is that policies should never be taken to be a “one size fits all”. Employers have the obligation to accommodate any reasonable adjustments an employee may need by virtue of their disability, and it is the employee who will know best as to what accommodations would truly help them.’