A POPULAR Lautoka coffee shop was issued a warning by the Consumer Council of Fiji after a worker issued a receipt which featured a derogatory comment about a customer’s physique.
Consumer Council of Fiji CEO Seema Shandil said a Lautoka woman lodged a complaint after she was issued a receipt which had the words “pink fat lady” written on it.
She said traders cannot issue receipts which used people’s physical attributes as identifiers and such incidences would not be tolerated. Mrs Shandil said they should make an effort to use other identifiers to take orders.
“Consumers should be treated with paramount respect as they pay for the goods and services and here we see that traders are labelling customers in a very insulting manner,” she said.
“If this has been a common practice, it must cease. These labels are nothing short of fat shaming and it is discriminatory.”
Mrs Shandil also urged traders to train their staff members on customer service.
“There are many other systems that traders can employ to identify and serve their customers, the number system for instance is an effective way.
“We need to move away from providing discriminatory, derogatory remarks to customers.
“Traders must remember consumer confidence is key to an effective business and incidences as such will not augur well for them.”
