In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, certain essential issues must be addressed, including: the medical condition itself (obviously); the impact of the medical condition upon one’s ability/inability to perform the type of positional duties required in one’s job (also quite obvious); the length of the medical condition itself (it must last for a minimum of 12 months); as well as multiple issues surrounding the question of whether the Agency can “accommodate” a medical condition.
The question of accommodations has been widely discussed by the undersigned author, especially in light of the case of Bracey v. OPM and multiple subsequent cases. Nevertheless, despite much discussion on the subject, and attempted clarification between the legal, technical usage of the term “accommodation” and the more loosely understood concept of an agency “accommodating” an individual, there is often a surrounding confusion about the conceptual distinctions being made. This is because, perhaps inherently, the technical term of art is not self-evident.
Take, for instance, Question 7a on SF 3112A, where the form asks the question, What accommodations have you requested from your agency? This question implies that you may have done something “wrong” if you have not specifically requested a certain type of accommodation — meaning, that you must have the knowledge to request of an agency the particular accommodating act of the agency which would allow you to perform all of the essential elements of one’s job.
Yet, this implicitly contradicts the very existence of SF 3112D, Agency Certification of Reassignment and Accommodation Efforts — which clearly places the burden of any attempted accommodation upon the agency, where — upon receipt of the disability retirement packet, or the medical evidence at any time — the agency must see if there are any jobs available or any method of accommodating the Federal or Postal employee such that he or she can perform the essential elementsof the job.
Thus, while the question (7a of SF 3112A) may have an underlying tone of a threat (as in, what have you done wrong?), it is in fact a fairly irrelevant question, and should be addressed as such. Remember, there is a distinction to be made between the question, the answer given, and the relevance of either.
Sincerely,
Robert R. McGill, Esquire
Filed under: Accommodation and Light Duty | Tagged: a common fallacy: I won't qualify for disability retirement if the federal agency accomodates me, accommodation efforts in the 3112a, accommodation under OPM disability law, disability retirement for postal workers under limited duty, disability retirement opm legal accommodation, excessing light duty from post office, Federal Disability, federal disability retirement, federal workmans comp limited duty capacity, FERS disability retirement, how federal managers define adequate accommodation in the workplace, ill postal workers and lack of viable accommodation plans in the usps, incentives to light duty employees to remain productive, injury compensation and light limited duty, law firm representing clients in opm disability law all across america, legal accommodation for Postal workers, legal accommodation under fers disability rules, light duty accommodation retirement, light duty and limited duty concepts in the federal workplace, light duty and reasonable accommodation, limited duty and rehab employees in the postal service, limited duty assignments united states postal service, minor job adjustments are not accommodations under fers disability law, one more warning about the 3112a and "accommodation efforts" by your agency employer, OPM disability retirement, owcp accommodations, Postal disability, postal service disability retirement, real accommodation under federal disability retirement law, reasonable accommodation of federal workers, Standard Form 3112D, the disabled federal worker and accommodation issues at the workplace, the perception of accommodation among federal supervisors, using the legal definition of accommodation in the 3112a, usps accommodation, USPS disability retirement, usps light duty is usually not real accommodation under opm disability rules, usps management reasonable accommodation, what's really legal accommodation under the fers and csrs statues | 1 Comment »
OPM Disability Retirement 