Employment & Labor Insider

I used to regularly post here on what the advice columnists in the media were saying in response to questions about workplace situations. It looks like my last one was in 2023.

What? It's 2026 already?

Dear Abby: Did Sophocles really say that? Abby: He sure did.

I love the advice columns. But Dear Abby had one this week that I just had to rant about. A letter writer in a customer-serving role said that customers and at least one co-worker were regularly hitting on her. She had tried to let them know that she wasn’t interested, but they weren’t taking the hints. She asked Abby what to do about it.

Abby started out fine. She told the writer to review her employer’s harassment policy. Always a good idea. But then she showed why, if you’re having problems in the workplace that might have legal ramifications, you should not be consulting with generic advice columnists.

(There are some advice writers who have backgrounds in Human Resources or business, such as Alison Green of the Ask a Manager blog, and Karla Miller, who recently shut down her column in the Washington Post. Another good one was Greg Giangrande, who had an employment-related column in the New York Post, but it doesn’t look like he’s written since 2024. In any event, these columnists provide -- or provided -- generally reliable advice about employment-law-related issues.)

Back to Dear Abby

With the harassing customers, Abby’s only suggestion was that the letter writer might want to think about wearing a fake wedding ring. More on that in a sec.

As far as the harassing co-worker was concerned, here was Abby’s advice in its entirety:

Start documenting what he has been doing and warn the other female employees. The next time it happens, inform him that the name for what he’s doing is harassment. It’s unwelcome and you will report it to your boss. If that doesn’t discourage him, follow through, because it could cost him his job.

This isn’t 100 percent wrong, but it isn’t 100 percent right, either.

True confession: I was a waitress at an airport restaurant for two summers while in college, and getting hit on by customers was a normal part of the job. In those days, sexual harassment was still legal.

(I also walked to school 10 miles in the snow. Every day. Even in August.)

So I did the wedding ring trick myself.

"Darling, with this ring no one will ever sexually harass you again."

My wedding ring trick did not end the bad behavior. In fact (this is really true, I promise), one customer, after I told him I was “married” and flashed my “wedding band” at him, replied without missing a beat, “Well, do you fool around?”

Very funny.

This guy aside, the fake ring did help somewhat. So Abby isn't completely off base. But she could have done better.

Let’s take the customers and the co-worker separately. What should Abby have said?

This is where the blog gets serious

Customer harassment.

It’s not unheard of for employees to be harassed by customers of the employer’s business. Also by other non-employees, such as vendors. Usually, the harassment is sexual, but sometimes it’s not. For example, hospitals and nursing homes sometimes have patients with dementia who use very racially offensive language directed at Black employees.

Employers are legally required to do what they can to protect their employees from harassment by third parties, including customers. So employees who are the victims of customer harassment – sexual or otherwise – should promptly notify the employer. Ideally, the employee would go straight to HR, but he or she may go to the supervisor instead. In that case, the supervisor should take it straight to HR. There are more effective ways to address sexual harassment than relying on the wedding ring trick. And I’m not aware of any equivalent to the ring trick in the racial harassment context.

Dealing with customers who harass (as opposed to vendors or employees) is tough for businesses because they depend economically on their customers and understandably want to keep the business if they can. But there are workarounds that may protect the employee without alienating the customer.

The most obvious workaround is The Swap. It might be possible for the employee-victim to simply stop working with the harassing customer and for another employee who is viewed as less “attractive” to assist instead. In the case of a heterosexual male customer who is harassing female employees, the ideal substitute would be a guy.

"Caitlyn is in meetings until October 2031. I'm Sledge. How may I help you?"

But if the behavior is bad enough, the employer may have no choice but to be more direct with the customer, or even stop doing business with the customer.

Racial harassment by a dementia patient is more difficult to address because the “harasser” is a sick patient who can't help him/herself. But in this type of situation as well as the sexual harassment scenario, the simplest solution might be to swap patient assignments between the Black employee-victim and a non-Black colleague.

The Swap can also work well where a member of the public, whom the government is sworn to serve, is harassing a government worker.

Co-workers.

Harassment by co-workers is usually easier for employers to address. I don’t have a problem with Abby’s advice about documenting the incidents. But the very best thing the letter writer could do is go straight to HR and report the harassment. There will be plenty of time afterward to document (and maybe find some corroborating witnesses).

As far as warning co-workers, the letter writer did not indicate that the co-worker was harassing anyone but her. There is no guarantee that her co-workers will agree with her. Some may side with the alleged harasser, which could cause even bigger problems for the letter writer. If she reports the harassment the right way (to HR), the co-worker may be placed on a final warning or even fired, making warnings to co-workers unnecessary. To the extent that any warnings are needed, HR may prefer to handle.

Unlike Abby, I would never give blanket advice to a harassment victim to confront the harasser directly. Sometimes that works, but it can backfire. The harasser may become hostile, threatening, or even violent. He might start stalking the victim. If he’s more subtle, he might start sabotaging her on the job. He might even make false complaints about her to HR.

The best general recommendation, applicable to all personalities and in all situations, is not to engage directly with the harasser, but to promptly report the behavior to Human Resources and then handle as HR recommends. No point in asking Dear Abby about it, apparently.

On the other hand, if you have a no-good lazy 35-year-old kid who won't get a job and doesn't lift a finger to help around the house, by all means Ask Abby. (Or is that Ask Amy? Oh, my gosh - she quit, too! No wonder I haven't written one of these since 2023!)