Can I inherit liability for a workplace accommodation the seller never properly provided?

It depends on your deal structure, but there's an important ongoing dimension here separate from historical liability. In a share purchase, generally yes — if the corporation failed to properly accommodate an employee, that's a liability of the corporation that continues under your ownership, and any related complaint or claim continues along with it.

In an asset purchase, historical liability for a failure that occurred entirely before closing generally stays with the seller as employer at the time, provided your agreement addresses this. But if you continue employing that person after a going-concern purchase, you take on your own, independent, ongoing obligation to accommodate them properly going forward, regardless of what the seller did or didn't do before you arrived — this isn't something you inherit from the seller so much as an obligation that simply attaches to you directly as the current employer of someone with an ongoing accommodation need.

Ask specifically about any employees with known accommodation needs and how they've actually been handled, both for historical exposure and to make sure you're prepared to meet your own ongoing obligation from day one. A Treadstone business lawyer can help you understand both dimensions of this.