Politics & Government
$350,000 Settlement Over Discrimination By San Leandro Company
A former employee told the company "it makes me sick to know that we refuse to service a particular ethnicity of people."
SAN LEANDRO, CA — The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on Wednesday announced a $350,000 settlement of a discrimination lawsuit filed against a San Leandro-based solar panel installation company on behalf of an Afghan-American former employee.
The EEOC alleged that Fidelity Home Energy Inc. had a policy of rejecting customers perceived to be of Middle Eastern or Indian ancestry and that Ayesha Faez, a former call center supervisor, was required to carry out the policy when she worked there in 2015.
It alleged that Faez, who came to the United States from Afghanistan when she was 1 year old, was required to refuse to make appointments or to cancel already-booked appointments for such customers, including some of Afghan origin.
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The EEOC said the company's alleged conduct constituted discriminatory creation of a hostile work environment on the basis of national origin.
Faez resigned from the company after about three weeks because of the stress, writing to her employers that "it makes me sick to know that we refuse to service a particular ethnicity of people," according to the EEOC.
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The $350,000 settlement, approved by U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White on Tuesday, was reached with Fidelity Home Energy and a successor company, NorCal Home Systems, which provided the same services after Fidelity's owners closed the business last fall.
The fund includes $201,000 for lost wages and emotional distress for Faez and $149,000 for lawyers who represented her in a companion lawsuit that was combined with the EEOC case. NorCal Home Systems is also required by the agreement to hire a consultant to help with revising anti-discrimination policies and procedures.
Representatives of the two companies were not immediately available for comment. The settlement document states that the companies do not admit to any liability for discrimination.
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