A man who worked at a call centre was subject to repeated racist remarks from callers. He raised the issue with his supervisors and management but they did not respond. When he said that he thought it was a human rights issue and was going to do something about it, he was fired.
As part of its training for all new hires at its call centre, the company agreed to specifically train employees on their rights and the employer’s obligations in situations where customers subject employees to discriminatory or harassing conduct. They also agreed to distribute a memo to all existing employees clarifying that discriminatory or harassing statements by customers on the basis of race, place of origin, ethnic origin or any other prohibited grounds of discrimination will not be tolerated by the company. The memo was also to remind employees of their right to speak to a supervisor or other member of management regarding those issues.