Society has become increasingly aware of the problem of sexual harassment in the workplace. Several high-profile  offenders have seen their careers harmed or ended.  Employers are beginning to realize the harm this behavior  among employees can cause. However, the problem might not
be the business’s workers; in many cases, it is the customers.

Harassment by customers may occur in any business, but it is especially prevalent in the hospitality sector. That’s especially
true if customers have been drinking and behave inappropriately toward waitresses, bartenders, casino dealers or housekeeping staff.

Sales representatives may be subjected to unwanted attention and language, particularly during client dinners where most of the diners are men. And nurses are regularly subjected to patients exposing themselves or touching them improperly.

Employers who do learn of these problems have at least a legal responsibility to address them. Some employers, such as restaurants, have a no-questions asked procedure whereby a server can report to a supervisor that a customer is making them feel uncomfortable and the supervisor will immediately assign someone else to that table.

This policy tells employees their complaints will be taken
seriously.

If an employee complains…

• Listen to them and take them seriously.
• Thank them for coming forward.
• Let them know that the issue will be addressed with the customer.
• Ask them to report any further incidents that may occur.
• Do nothing to imply that they will be retaliated against.

What to do next

• Investigate the incident, including discussions with any witnesses.
• If the customer is from another business, refer the matter to an appropriate person at that company. This should be someone with the authority to take any necessary action.
• If the customer is an individual, separate the employee and the customer.
• If the customer persists, issue a warning.
• As a last resort, ask the customer to leave the premises.

The legal implications

Employers cannot afford to ignore these problems. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission regulations hold an employer liable for harassment by non-employees over whom it has control, such as customers on the premises, if it knew, or should have known about the harassment and failed to take prompt and appropriate corrective action. The EEOC levies penalties of up to six figures for sexual harassment. In addition, victimized employees may sue their employers for tolerating hostile work environments. Settling these lawsuits can be costly.

If the employers do not carry employment practices liability insurance, settlement costs and attorney and court fees will be paid for out of pocket. Lastly, the failure to protect employees from harassment can lower workplace morale. This will inevitably lead to increased staff turnover. The employer will lose valuable employees and be faced with the cost of hiring replacements.

Federal law gives employees the right to feel safe at work, free from mistreatment by co-workers, supervisors and on employees. It is also good business practice to provide a place
where people want to work. Employers must be vigilant about possible mistreatment of staff by customers and vendors. Tolerating this behavior may save a customer in the short run, but it will cost the business dearly in the longer term.

A final thought: Sexual harassment is not the sole preserve of men harassing women. It is also an issue of women harassing men, men harassing men, or one female harassing another.

With risks to companies and employees growing, sometimes the unthinkable happens and a business has a real crisis on its hands. While large companies are usually well-prepared for a crisis should one occur, most small and mid-sized firms don’t have the resources or have not put much thought into how they would handle a crisis.
One of the most difficult parts of crisis planning is just what to prepare for, since a crisis could be a number of different  events, like:

• The sudden death of a key member of your team.
• A defective product leads to an injury, illness – or worse.
• An accident severely maims or kills a number of your workers.

Your strategy

To get started, assemble a team that includes key members from your organization who will be responsible for creating your crisis-response plan. Inc. Magazine recommends the following for your team:

Make a plan – You cannot start planning without first identifying your objectives. Once you identify them, you can make response plans for each type of event. Typically, that includes:

• Safeguarding any person (employee, vendor, customer and/ or the public) who may be affected by the crisis. Your plan would include how to respond to the crisis if people’s health and wellness are at stake.
• Making sure the organization survives. This would include steps you would take to ensure the company can continue as a going concern after a significant disruption.
• Keeping stakeholders (employees, vendors, clients, the public and government) informed on developments.

Create a succession plan – You should clearly outline the necessary steps to follow if you or one of your key managers suddenly became unable to perform their duties. This plan may include selling the company, or transferring ownership to family members or key employees. Seek advice from the experts – This includes your leadership team,  employees, customers, communications experts, investment bankers, exit planners, lawyers and financial managers. Each of these individuals has unique insights that can be invaluable for how to tackle a crisis.

Name a spokesperson – This is important if you have a crisis that spreads beyond your organization and affects the health and safety of a member of the general public, your staff or customers. Funneling all media communications through a spokesperson can help you deliver a clear and consistent message to media, as well as to the public at large.

Honesty is the best policy – A lack of honesty and transparency can lead to rumors, as well as a general
distrust of your organization if the truth is exposed. The best approach is to be transparent and truthful about what happened and what you are doing to resolve the crisis.

Keep your staff up to speed – To stop the rumor mill and also keep employees from becoming worried amidst the uncertainty, keep your workers abreast of developments – and what the crisis means for the organization, and what you are doing about it.

Keep customers and suppliers informed – If you have an event that’s causing some disruptions, you also owe it to your clients and vendors to let them know what’s happening. Like your employees, keep them regularly updated on events and the steps you are taking to address the crisis. Put together a plan for how you would keep them posted.

Act fast and update regularly – Keeping the communications alive is important and once you grasp the  situation and its effects, you can issue summary statements of the crisis and what’s happened. Then you can follow up with regular updates on your action plans, on people affected, any hotline you may set up, and more. These days news travels fast and like wildfire on social media. You need to move at the same pace.

Social media is vital – More and more people get their news from social media and the discussions that ensure on  posts, so you need to make sure that your company stays on top of the flow. You may want to assign a person or two to monitor social media and post and react to posts on social media. That way, your team can tell the company’s side of the story and put to rest unfounded rumors.

Make a plan for what a social media contact’s responsibilities would be during a crisis. Get an early start Your plan won’t be effective if you create it during a crisis. Plan in advance, so everyone can approach the strategizing unrushed and with a clear head.

Employers with on-call workers who have to phone in to check on a scheduled shift are now required to pay them reporting pay, a California appellate court has ruled. The court held in the precedent-setting case of Ward vs. Tilly’s, Inc. that an employee scheduled for an on-call shift may be entitled to partial wages for that shift despite never physically reporting to work. The case hinged on what’s known as “reporting pay.”

DEFINITION OF ‘REPORTING PAY’

California’s Industrial Welfare Commission (IWC) has wage orders that require employers to pay workers who show up for a shift and then are told they won’t be working the scheduled shift.
Under the wage orders, an employer has to pay an employee who is required to report for work and does report, but is not put to work or works less than half their usual or scheduled day’s work. Reporting pay is a minimum of two hours’ pay and a maximum of four hours.

THE CASE

In the Ward vs. Tilly’s, Inc. case, employees were required to phone in to see if they would be working that day. The plaintiff in the case said that he was owed reporting pay because calling in to see if he was scheduled was essentially the same as showing up at work and being told he didn’t have to work that day, as per the IWC’s wage orders.

The appellate court on Feb. 4, 2019, upheld a lower court’s ruling that had sided with the plaintiff. It’s unclear whether the defendant will appeal the case to the California Supreme Court, but until that time and up to any potential decision, the ruling stands.

WHAT IT MEANS FOR EMPLOYERS

Previously, reporting pay was limited to those employees who physically reported to work. Now, any employee that has to call in to check on a scheduled shift will be due half of the wages they would have earned by working the shift they were on call for. The amount of reporting pay is based on the number of hours the employee normally works.

EXAMPLE: Justin, an on-call worker, is usually scheduled for six-hour shifts. When he called in on Wednesday, he was told he did not need to come into work that day. Based on the appellate court ruling, Justin must receive up to one-half of his scheduled shift, or three hours’ pay.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

• Conduct a cost-benefit analysis of retaining or keeping on-call status for employees.
• If you have on-call workers, update your employee handbook to reflect the new policy.
• If any of your workers were on call and were told not to work a shift after the Feb. 4 court ruling, you should pay them for the reporting pay they are owed.

MANY BUSINESS owners don’t think twice when asking a worker to run to the office supply store, to the bank or run another errand for the company while on the clock.

But as soon as that employee enters their personal vehicle on a trip for your business, you automatically become vicariously liable for their actions.

Think it’s not a big deal? There have been cases when employers have been found liable and ordered to pay up to $25 million for crashes involving employees using their cell phones while driving, according to the National Safety Council.

That means if your employee is in an accident and injures a third party, damages another car or injures themselves, your firm could be held liable.

For injuries to only your employee, your workers’  compensation insurance would handle the costs, but for injuries to others and third party property, you are ultimately liable since they were carrying out duties for your firm.

The employee’s auto insurance will be primary, but the problem arises when the coverage is insufficient. The employer can then be sued by the third party.

And once a third party knows there is an employer behind the person who hit them, that often encourages them to sue, seeking, even more, damages than they normally would.

With that in mind, you should do all you can to reduce your exposure by writing a policy for your driving employees (see box on right). Besides having a driving policy in place, you can also make sure to hire employees who are safe drivers by checking their driving records
during the hiring process.

Also, make sure that your management is on board with the policy. That means that managers should avoid texting or calling employees while they are driving on company duty. That would clash with your policy on barring cell-phone use while driving.

Finally, you should make sure that you have proper insurance in place in case calamity strikes. And unfortunately, some employees will inevitably be slack in following even the best laid out policies.

Commercial auto will cover all of your workers who drive company vehicles for collisions, but it won’t cover employees if they are driving their own vehicles while on the job. Such vehicles are considered non-owned autos because they are not owned by the named insured.

Employees are not insureds while driving non-owned autos,
even if they are using the vehicles for company business.
But if you do have workers who use their personal vehicles for
work, like sales reps, you can purchase an endorsement for your commercial auto policy: Entitled Employees as Insureds.

This endorsement covers workers who drive their personal vehicles on behalf of their employer. But it provides excess coverage only, meaning that the employee’s personal auto policy will apply first if the worker is sued after an accident
involving their personal auto. The endorsement would apply only if the employee’s personal policy limits are breached.