WWGRMD - dog allergy in a dog friendly workplace

First, I like dogs. I can't have any of my own because of the allergy, but I like them and they tend to be OK with me, too. However, the allergy manifests itself when I'm regularly exposed to dogs.

Problem is, I work in a company that is dog friendly, thus we have dogs around. Which is fine, only that I'm now back on expensive eye meds for allergic reactions as I've been exposed to dogs more than usual. To make matters more interesting, the health insurance is having hissy fits every time my optometrist prescribes this medication and I'm having a week long bun fight with the employer provided health insurance to get them to cover it. On every monthly refill, as most of the time they don't want to authorise automatic refills and I'm getting tired of these games.

My concern is that if I kick up a fuss about the health insurance issues, I may have to go on record with HR about this. Which may affect the dog policy and I don't want that, but I also don't want to pay $3.8k/year for the medication myself either.

WWGRMD?

Did you know about the dog policy when your hired on? If yes then just keep rolling with it. Yes it's a pain for you but it's what you signed up for. Additionally, HR should (hopefully) be able to roll with it as well.

If it is covered by the ADA, and it may be, then the employer must make reasonable accommodation.

Hopefully something that can be mutually agreed upon without escalating to legal pushing and shoving.

Can they give you a private office to isolate you from the poochies?

Relevent linky

mazdeuce wrote: Did you know about the dog policy when your hired on? If yes then just keep rolling with it. Yes it's a pain for you but it's what you signed up for. Additionally, HR should (hopefully) be able to roll with it as well.

Pooch policy came into being after I got hired. One of the reasons that it's becoming more of an issue is that my job changed and I now have to have more interactions with people in the sections of the building that the majority of the dogs are in, and I can't always have them come to my office.

bludroptop wrote: If it is covered by the ADA, and it may be, then the employer must make reasonable accommodation.

That's an interesting idea, I haven't even looked at it that way.

bludroptop wrote: Hopefully something that can be mutually agreed upon without escalating to legal pushing and shoving.

Only way I'd roll in this case. The reason I'm so reluctant to say anything is precisely because I don't want anybody to get the idea of rolling back the policy, but I also don't want to chase my employer provided insurance once every month to once every couple of months.

bludroptop wrote: Can they give you a private office to isolate you from the poochies? Relevent linky

Already have the private office - most of us here do, and I'm management so I have to have one.

If it was after the fact, I think it needs to be brought up to HR and they need to deal with the insurance company to accommodate you. It's their job.

Make it extremely clear you don't want to be the party pooper and you just want to get the insurance stuff dealt with.

I like dogs too, but geez, bringing it to work?

I'm tired of the new trend with people taking their dogs to festivals, farmers markets, bars with outdoor patios.

Some people don't have other options if they want to have a dog, unless they want to lock it in their apartment or house for the whole day.

Take Zyrtec 24hr liquid gels......they work.

Can I get a T-Shirt made with WWGRMD?

yamaha wrote: Take Zyrtec 24hr liquid gels......they work.

They don't for me. But I'm very allergic to everything so not much does. For me Claritin is better than most but really all they do is take the edge off and keep me from having constant asthma attacks.

BoxheadTim wrote: Some people don't have other options if they want to have a dog, unless they want to lock it in their apartment or house for the whole day.

I've just never heard of such a thing of people bringing their dogs to work. I would think it would be a massive distraction.

I'd basically talk to Boss/HR (I you don't want to) and spell it out. Or deal with it.

Those unfortunately seem to be the only two options.

In reply to nicksta43:

Strange, I can do about everything short of spending time in the equivelant of a dust bowl. Claratin was worthless at that chore.

SyntheticBlinkerFluid wrote: If it was after the fact, I think it needs to be brought up to HR and they need to deal with the insurance company to accommodate you. It's their job. Make it extremely clear you don't want to be the party pooper and you just want to get the insurance stuff dealt with.

This right here. It's HR's job to deal with insurance and workplace conflict. It's the whole reason they exist.

In reply to yamaha:

I think it's an individual thing. I've been pumped full of everything that they have came up with over the years and some work better than others. I ran out of my doctor prescribed stuff last week and bought some of that zyrtec. I was out on the bike and my eyes started to swell shut and my helmet was filling up from my snot factory. I had to cut the ride short and get indoors. Allergies suck.

Wife is allergic to dogs and cats, we have 6 dogs, 4 cats. She gets allergy shots once a week and the insurance doesn't complain. Maybe your insurance would be more inclined to support the shots instead of the eyedrops.

BoxheadTim wrote: Some people don't have other options if they want to have a dog, unless they want to lock it in their apartment or house for the whole day.

Uh... that is what normal people (like 95%) of dog owners do...

And yea, this is something I have NEVER heard of before.

BoxheadTim wrote: Some people don't have other options if they want to have a dog, unless they want to lock it in their apartment or house for the whole day.

my dumbass dog stays in the house all day and doesn't mind. maybe he's too stupid to realize he's stuck in the kitchen all day so he just sleeps on the chair. i'd "accidentally" forget to bring him home one day if i had to take him everywhere with me. that would get old fast.

yamaha wrote: Take Zyrtec 24hr liquid gels......they work.

I'm buying some tomorrow. Pollen is killing me right now. Oak pollen to be exact. I'm taking some bullE36 M3 benedryl knockoff that makes me drowsey. It sucks while working on cars.

I'm not even sure this is a Health Insurance question...sounds like Worker's Comp.

You are an employee. The dogs are not. The company has a much higher responsibility to provide for your needs than the dogs.

A policy? Seriously? Like a written policy? I have NEVER heard of anything like this. Assistance animals, sure. But pets?

Are they allowed to bring their kids too? Can I bring my pet anaconda?

I like dogs. A company policy that allows them to be brought into the workplace en mass is crazy.

And I'm not sure it is even legal. There ARE allergy conditions that are protected by the ADA. That means employees and customers have Constitutional protection, and a right to expect they can go into a place of business without being exposed to harmful influences.

What would happen if a customer collapsed due to a severe reaction of some sort? Unless they are violating the dog's Constitutional rights, the dogs have gotta go.

This is an HR problem, not yours.

AFAIK it's a written policy, yes. And it's not that uncommon out here, especially down in Silly Valley with some of the hipper startups.

BTW, we don't have customer traffic at this site. Speaking as a software developer, you normally don't want my type anywhere near a customer :).

This looks like it'll be a discussion with HR on Monday then, thanks for all the feedback.

BoxheadTim wrote: BTW, we don't have customer traffic at this site.

OK, but that doesn't change the ADA. Access for disabled persons is not optional, regardless of whether it is "cool" or "hip".

I'll be interested in hearing what happens with HR.

Are dogs the ONLY allergens you have? Are you SURE they are the sole reason for needing the drops? If not, thus gets a lot easier from m your perspective as its just the insurance company being a bag of dicks and HR should be ready to go to bat with you.

Maybe an excuse to let you work from home?

Make the point to mention how much this is costing the company. You have to call the insurance company during work hours, so your salary multiplied by the amount of time you spend dealing with this petty BS instead of doing your job adds up. Had a similar problem with insurance at a former employer. Once I went to HR and pointed out that every hour I spent dealing with the problem was costing the company $ (especially since my time working on projects was charged to clients at an even higher rate) HR started handling it. Every time I got a letter from the health insurance company when they wouldn't pay the bill I would photocopy it and take it to one individual in HR to handle.

I later found out from a friend that worked for that insurance provider that they paid bonuses to the people who processed claims. If they process all their claims for one day they got like 10% extra for that day. If they did that every day of the week they got a larger bonus and if they processed all their claims each day for a month they got another larger bonus. He told me that everybody in claims processing spent the last part of each work day "completing" the claims for the day (which meant rejecting them without even looking at them) so they could get the bonuses. Apparently, the rejected claims were then handled by another group so they didn't even have to deal with the fallout...