North Carolina-based food processing company Butterball violated the Americans with Disabilities Act when it failed to reasonably accommodate an employee with breast cancer and fired her after Voya Financial, its third-party benefits administrator, failed to process her request for disability-related leave, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission charged in a March 31 lawsuit.
A representative for Butterball stated in an email to HR Dive that, “As a policy, Butterball does not comment on ongoing legal matters.”
Per the complaint in EEOC v. Butterball LLC, the employee worked at a turkey processing plant in Mount Olive, North Carolina. With her daughter’s assistance, the employee, who identifies as Haitian and speaks almost exclusively Haitian Creole, advised Butterball of her cancer diagnosis and requested leave to attend medical appointments and recover from her chemotherapy treatments, according to the complaint.
Butterball instructed the women to contact Voya, which directed them to use its online claims process, the lawsuit alleged. Following that process, they filed a critical illness claim and request for leave, but Voya allegedly didn’t follow up on the request.
As a result, the employee incurred attendance points when she missed several shifts due to her cancer treatment, the complaint said. Allegedly, when she returned to work, she gave Butterball a note from her medical providers explaining her need for the absences, but the company still issued her a final warning about her attendance.
After she missed more shifts due to the chemotherapy, Butterball fired her, the lawsuit alleged. The complaint also alleged that during a meeting with HR, the employee provided a second medical note, again disclosing her disability and need for leave, but Butterball stuck with its decision to terminate her.
“Even when an employer hires a third-party benefits administrator, the employer remains responsible for complying with anti-discrimination law. The EEOC will continue to hold employers accountable when employee rights are violated under such circumstances,” EEOC Regional Attorney Melinda Dugas emphasized in a media release.
Butterball allegedly violated the ADA when, after learning of the employee’s diagnosis and need for disability-related leave, it “washed its hands of the matter and left [her] … to deal with [Voya] without assistance,” the lawsuit said.
Additionally, although Voya was an agent for Butterball and authorized to act on its behalf to administer its disability-related leave policies, Butterball “failed to exercise reasonable care to ensure Voya was executing [its policies] in a manner that complied with the law,” the complaint charged.
Other third-party administrators have recently been under fire for cybersecurity leaks and alleged mishandling of employee-sensitive data. In 2025, P.F. Chang’s asked a court to dismiss its lawsuit alleging that HR services provider UKG breached a contract between the two parties when UKG lost the restaurant chain’s employee data and information.