According to the Americans with disabilities act, they apparently are under obligation to do it.
They’re under obligation to make a reasonable accommodation. They accomplish this in 2 ways. You can either order it without milk, or you can pay extra for a milk substitute.
Restaurants aren’t required to provide gluten-free pasta, fake seafood, or artificial peanut products just because some people can’t eat everything on the menu.
Do you have a source? My understanding was that they were under obligation to not charge for the accommodations, hence the lawsuit.
Their accommodation is having product without milk at all. Requiring them to provide an alternative ingredient isn’t a reasonable accommodation when they have plenty of existing products without dairy. The customer can order one of those items.
Having a milk substitute that costs more for the establishment is going beyond what is required under the ADA, so up-charging for it is fine.
The ADA has very specific language about not charging extra for reasonable accommodations, and dietary restrictions are mentioned.
Restaurants are not required to stock ingredients for all allergies, and they are not required to order in special ingredients on request. But starbucks does stock non-dairy milks. Using the non-dairy milk that they already stock is a reasonable accommodation.
The case is based on a good faith reading of title III of the ADA. It’s not unreasonable to argue that charging extra is illegal in this case.
Do you have a source for that? From what I’ve found, food allergies are generally not considered a disability and therefore no accomodation is obligatory.
The ADA is a complex law, like all laws. Food allergies are mentioned by the ADA.
Although food allergies don’t require proactive accommodation, disabled people are entitled to equal access despite their disability.
If a restaurant offers no substitutions that’s fine. But if a restaurant offers substitutions but refuses it for those with allergies, that’s not fine.
If a restaurant doesn’t stock non-allergic ingredients it doesn’t have to. But if the restaurant will stock special ingredients upon request, they must do the same for disabled customers.
In this case, starbucks DOES stock and offer non-dairy milks. Using a different milk is probably a reasonable accommodation. The ADA has rules against charging extra for reasonable accomodations.
The conclusion that starbucks charging extra is a violation of the ADA is not an unreasonable one.
It is not a violation to charge extra for an accomodation if everyone has to pay the same for that accomodation. See the link I posted previously; it mentions this explicitly. Their case is charging more for plus sized clothing. The price for that size of item is the same regardless if the person is obese or normal, so it’s not discrimination. It only becomes discrimination when you charge a person more because they’re lactose intolerant and give lactose tolerant people soy milk for no cost.
