The recent Employment Tribunal case of Mutombo-Mpania v Angard Staffing Solutions Ltd looked at what evidence an employee has to produce to prove they are disabled and when an employer will be deemed to know that an employee is disabled when the employee hasn’t told them about their disability.
The Claimant worked for an organisation providing casual staff to the Royal Mail Group. On joining he did not indicate a disability on his application form and he failed to disclose a disability on a health form.
He suffered from Essential Hypertension. Despite medication, his symptoms included headaches, fatigue, breathing difficulties and lack of confidence. He told his employer that this meant he couldn’t work night shifts.
The Claimant provided no evidence for the tribunal of the functional impact of his impairment on his ability to carry out normal day to day activities. The Tribunal held that he had failed to establish that he was disabled because of the lack of evidence.
As the employee had worked night shifts before and had previously denied having a disability, the employer could not be expected to have worked out that this employee considered himself to be disabled.
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