Problems When You Refuse Service to Customers or Clients
You may already know that when it comes to customers, just like your employees, you can’t discriminate. Refusing to serve customers or clients because of things like gender or race or nationality or religion, among other categories, can land you in deep legal trouble.
But what about for reasons that aren’t protected, or which aren’t considered discriminatory? Can you refuse to serve or do business with whomever you want for whatever reason you want, so long as you don’t discriminate?
You Can Refuse Service Sometimes
The simple answer is that yes, you can refuse to do business with whomever you want, for whatever (non-discriminatory) reason that you want. You’ve probably seen signs that say things like “no shirt no shoes no service,” which is a legal reason to refuse to serve people (or to kick them out of your physical premises, if you have one).
But problems can arise, when you refuse a customer service for a valid non-discriminatory reason, but that customer is also a member of a protected class. As an example, imagine a rude, harassing customer in a grocery store who gets kicked out by management–but that customer also happens to be a pregnant woman.
The customer sees this as illegal gender and pregnancy discrimination. The business owner sees this as simply legally removing a disruptive and unruly customer.
Staying Out of Trouble
If you can specify a legitimate, non-discriminatory reason for refusing to serve anybody, you are generally legally safe from discrimination liability. To be extra safe however, there are steps that you can take, when you refuse service to someone.
The first thing is to be as specific as possible, in your removal policies. So, for example, don’t generally and vaguely say “management can remove anybody we choose,” but rather, a policy that says “management can remove anybody who is disrupting other customers,” may be better.
If someone does have to be removed from the premises or denied service, treat it like an accident that requires an incident report; you may want to get statements from witnesses, or have your employees fill out a form describing what happened.
Accidental Discrimination
Remember as well, to be mindful of discriminating accidentally. So, for example, if you had a theater and removed a patron because she was getting up and going to the bathroom too much, you might be removing someone with a protected disability, a disability that causes them to have to use the restroom more than an average amount of time.
Likewise, removing someone who might be making what appears to be disruptive noises, could be someone with a disability.
Forcible Removal
The right to forcibly remove customers, is generally reserved for law enforcement; your business should not physically remove customers who don’t want to leave, unless that person is causing an immediate threat of harm to others on your property.
Call our Fort Lauderdale business attorneys at Sweeney Law P.A. at 954-440-3993 for help with your business’ legal needs.
Sources:
nextinsurance.com/blog/right-to-refuse-service-to-rude-customers/
miamiherald.com/news/business/article311958815.html
