Friday, January 29th, 2016
The Justice Department announced today that it has reached an agreement with Kemper Moving Systems, Inc., a Huntsville, Alabama, franchise of Two Men and a Truck, to resolve allegations that the moving company violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) when it refused to complete a customer’s move because of the customer’s Hepatitis-C. The agreement resolves violations of Title III of the ADA. Upon learning that a customer had Hepatitis-C, the moving company refused to complete her move because its employees feared they would get Hepatitis-C even though the customer explained to both the movers and their supervisors that individuals cannot contract Hepatitis-C by moving furniture or through casual contact. As a result of Two Men and a Truck’s refusal to complete the move on the scheduled move-out date, the customer had to pay rent for two apartments, locate last minute replacement movers and incur various other expenses.
Under the two year agreement, which is being filed as a court-enforceable consent decree, Two Men and a Truck will adopt a series of nondiscrimination training and policy reforms. The agreement also requires the company to hire or designate an ADA Compliance Official responsible for reviewing all disability-related decisions. Under the consent decree, Two Men and a Truck must pay $10,000 in compensatory damages to the customer and pay a civil penalty of $3,500 to the United States. Finally, Two Men and a Truck must report to the Department on its ongoing compliance with the terms of the consent decree.
To find out more about this consent decree or the ADA, call the Justice Department’s toll-free ADA information line
at 800-514-0301 or 800-514-0383 (TDD), or access its ADA website at www.ada.gov.
Article Credit: U.S. Department of Justice