Lambda Legal announced a settlement last week between United Parcel Service and a gay couple who were forced to live apart for nine months because same-sex couples did not qualify for UPS’s ‘trailing spouse’ policy, which allowed employees to relocate to another office when their spouse’s job forced a move. The lawsuit, filed in California state court last year by Lambda Legal on behalf of the couple, was dismissed today after the disputes between the parties were satisfactorily resolved.
In August 2003, Lambda Legal filed a lawsuit against UPS on behalf of Daniel Kline, who has worked for the company for more than two decades, and his partner of 27 years, Frank Sories. In January 2003, Sories was transferred from San Francisco to Chicago by his employer, United Airlines, when its office in San Francisco closed. Kline applied for a transfer to UPS’s Chicago branch under the company’s ‘trailing spouse’ policy to follow his life partner to Chicago. The corporation rejected Kline’s transfer because the men are gay and therefore were not able to marry each other under California law at that time.
UPS now has agreed, however, to provide the same job relocation benefits to employees in domestic partnerships as it does to its married employees.