Reasonable adjustment
1. Introduction
Association of Chairs is committed to providing support to those who have responsibility for chairing and leading the boards of charities and non-profits. We are committed to supporting disabled people and value the contribution they bring. We have an inclusive approach to engaging with people and recognise that some people have different needs.
Please let us know if you need us to make any reasonable adjustments for you.
2. What is a reasonable adjustment?
A reasonable adjustment involves making a change to the way that we usually do things to ensure that we are fair to disabled people.
3. Our duty to make reasonable adjustments as a service provider
As a service provider, under the Equality Act 2010, Association of Chairs has a legal duty to make reasonable adjustments if the way that we carry out our functions places a disabled person at a substantial disadvantage compared to someone who is not disabled.
The duty requires Association of Chairs to consider what can be done to overcome any such disadvantage and whether an adjustment can be made which is reasonable in all the circumstances of the situation. We will take into account the needs of the disabled person and the considerations as set out in Section 6.
4. Requesting reasonable adjustment
To request a reasonable adjustment in relation to completing an Association of Chairs membership application form, please email [email protected] or call 020 7898 9731.
To request a reasonable adjustment for an event, please make your access requirement clear when completing the booking form. To provide further details of your access requirement for an event, please contact [email protected].
To request a reasonable adjustment for a meeting, please make your access requirement clear when arranging the meeting with the relevant member of Association of Chairs staff.
To request a reasonable adjustment for our written resources, please contact [email protected].
5. Types of reasonable adjustment we can make
Whilst we will consider each request for reasonable adjustments individually, there are some common adjustments which we will offer as a matter of course and some other adjustments that we can make arrangements to provide.
The adjustments will be discussed with the person concerned to avoid making incorrect assumptions about a person’s needs.
Some examples of the simple reasonable adjustments that the Association of Chairs can make may include:
- arranging meetings and events in venues which have appropriate facilities
- providing documents in a larger font size
- using email or the telephone in preference to online applications/booking forms where appropriate, which may assist those with a vision impairment.
We may be able to provide other arrangements, such as providing a sign language interpreter or lipspeaker for some of our events.
Please give as much notice as possible of adjustment requirements as some adjustments can take longer to arrange.
Common adjustments which we provide as a matter of course are to always use wheelchair accessible venues for our external events. We also provide many of our events and training as online webinars.
6. How we decide what is ‘reasonable’
In many cases, it will be quite straightforward to make an adjustment for you. In some cases, we will consider the request in more detail to consider what is a reasonable adjustment in the particular situation and discuss with you.
The Equality Act itself does not define what is ‘reasonable’ but the Equality and Human Rights Commission has provided statutory guidance in its code of practice for services, public functions and associations. In order to decide whether an adjustment is ‘reasonable’ we will consider the following factors:
- how effective the change will be in assisting disabled people in general or a particular service user or member
- whether it can actually be done
- the cost, and
- Association of Chairs’ resources and size.
Association of Chairs will take all relevant issues into account and balance the factors to decide whether an adjustment is reasonable.
Please let us know if you need us to make any reasonable adjustments for you to help you access our events and services.