The interactive process is a two-way street - and this applicant stopped talking
A deaf man applied to drive wheelchair vans. Turned down, he sued - and a federal appeals court sided with the employer.
On July 13, 2026, the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit upheld a lower-court ruling that Brewster Ambulance Service did not violate the Americans with Disabilities Act when it declined to hire a deaf applicant as a Chair Car Driver.
The applicant, who is deaf and communicates primarily in American Sign Language, applied in January 2019 for the role, which involves driving wheelchair-using patients to medical appointments. He asked for one accommodation: Video Relay Services, a federally funded tool that connects a deaf user to an ASL interpreter by video, along with a holder for his phone.
Brewster, a family-owned company with about 1,800 employees, argued the job demanded near-constant communication with dispatch, patients, and staff at medical facilities. Drivers, it said, must respond instantly to emergencies such as heart attacks and falls. The company relies on a one-button radio system, so drivers never take their eyes off the road, and it testified that distracted driving is the top cause of its vehicle accidents.
HR was closely involved throughout. Before the interview, the HR manager and a regional manager traded emails about how a deaf driver might be accommodated. One manager initially recommended hiring him. But after an interview and a ride-along, managers worried he could not communicate with patients or facility staff. Brewster considered moving him into a Day Care Van Driver role, only to find it "require[d] the same amount of communications." A billing job had no openings for someone without experience.
The company's rejection letter set out five detailed questions and answers explaining its safety concerns, and the HR manager invited more discussion. The applicant acknowledges he never wrote back.
At a February 2025 trial, the jury split - finding for Brewster on the failure-to-hire claim but for the applicant on a separate theory that the company failed to engage in the required "interactive process." The trial judge threw out that second finding, and the First Circuit affirmed that result.
The reasoning is what HR should note. The court repeated that the interactive process is "a two-way street," and held that a breakdown in that dialogue creates no liability when no accommodation would have let the applicant perform the job's essential functions without "undue hardship." A flawed process, in other words, is not itself a violation if no workable fix existed.
For HR leaders, the lesson is practical: pin down each role's essential functions, document every accommodation conversation, and look hard at alternative positions - while remembering that applicants share the duty to keep talking.
