Hermes Delivery Driver Sexual Harassment

Yes. That's exactly what I mean. He was demanding her slippers should be sexy enough to greet him at the door 🙄🙄

There's a world if difference between a lascivious comment designed to intimate and some average Joe (or Josephine) making a daft comment on comedy slippers

As a young woman she should know that she was put on this Earth to be eye candy for all men.

I would absolutely use a female only company, for stuff where I have to let the tradesperson into my home. Would put my mind at ease somewhat tbh, even though I do know namalt..don't worry lurkers!

Yes, I was wondering if he was being sarcastic..

Was he definitely being serious at their 'sexiness'? The context changes for me if they were big cartoon head fluffy ones...

When is something harassment under the Act?
Generally speaking harassment is behaviour which causes you distress or alarm.

The Act also says you must have experienced at least two incidents by the same person or group of people for it to be harassment.

It's the courts that decide if something is harassment under the Act. The courts will look at whether most people or a reasonable person would think the behaviour amounts to harassment.

One comment is not harassment. Just tell him next time you see him "Any more personal or inappropriate comments directed at my slippers or me will be reported to your company"

I've had it the opposite way round.

I worked for Hermes last year and I had a business I used to deliver to and it was on a daily basis. Every day the same member of staff would rush out and make inappropriate comments to me, to the point I dreaded going to work knowing it was likely I'd be delivering to him. In the end I complained to his company and told Hermes I refused to deliver to him ever again.
Also left card with a phone number to be contacted about a parcel to then start getting text messages from a guy that thought it was acceptable to be really creepy to his delivery driver.

I would say put a complaint in to Hermes about the drivers comment to your daughter but complaining to Hermes can often be impossible. Usually have the same driver for the area though so I'd make sure I caught him one day and told him straight how inappropriate he was x

He was being an inappropriate dick, but for your daughter to feel violated, embarrassed, humiliated and shat on sounds a bit OTT. Maybe I'm probably just hardened to it all.

Stopcocks 😂 Love it!

I'd really recommend buying her a copy of the Gift of Fear if she hasn't read it. It helps you understand why you react in a certain way in situations and how to trust your gut instinct and gives some good advice on how to react to strange men pushing normal boundaries. It's not something she should be ashamed about at all. It definitely shouldn't be dismissed easily as something to forget about, as men often escalate when they get away with harassing behaviour.

As much as I agree he is out of line, I’d also encourage resilience, feeling violated because he said the phrase “sexy slippers” seems a strong reaction to me, and would concern me if it was my daughter.

People are going to say stupid shit. It doesn’t make it ok, and you can’t change the world, what you can change is your reaction to it.

Unfortunately not uncommon, I had the same with a driver from a different company. He would always comment about what I was wearing, and when I saw him when I was out and about he would say something inappropriate. I did send a complaint through but nothing happened, so just stopped ordering from companies that used them as the courier, but it's sad it comes to that

'No animal in the wild, suddenly overcome with fear, would spend any of its mental energy thinking, "It's probably nothing." Yet we chide ourselves for even momentarily giving validity to the feeling that someone is behind us on a seemingly empty street, or that someone's unusual behavior might be sinister. Instead of being grateful to have a powerful internal resource, grateful for the self-care, instead of entertaining the possibility that our minds might actually be working for us and not just playing tricks on us, we rush to ridicule the impulse.' - The Gift of Fear, Gavin De Becker.

So instead of teaching our dd's that these types of comments are rude we need to be teaching them to be resilient, and by your post, it sounds like you mean suck it up, brush it off?

Ffs

Make the complaint, and then practice with your DD saying 'fuck off creep'. That's the sort of resilience I want my DD to have.

And women don't have to make chitchat with lonely males

We once had a dpd driver who obsessed over our neighbour and was forever trying to chat her up and asking questions about her and if she had a partner etc. Carried it on even when found out she was married. Tried pressing us to get her number and info etc.

He ended up getting moved to another round after we both complained. I feel for any women he comes into contact with

To all the people saying “he was just making conversation”, I guess he wouldn’t have commented on a man’s “sexiness”. So it’s targeted and sexist. Why not comment on the weather, rather than saying he finds her clothing sexually attractive? The apologists are gross. No woman should have to put up with this and then be accused of overreacting when she doesn’t like it.

It's always difficult to judge a situation without having been there but I sort of agree with BeepBoopBop. Human interactions can be marred by misunderstanding and clumsiness. In terms of imbalance of power, yes, an adult male has more power than a young female, but delivery drivers are hardly at the top of the economic ladder.

I agree the comment was uncalled for but it needs to be seen in perspective (creepy comment on footwear versus comments on body part or touching). It's hard to decide in some situations whether a little bit of forgiveness and benefit of the doubt is better than a more punishing approach but I think it's always worth considering.

If it were my adult daughter, I would probably encourage her to be more resilient. Sexy slippers as a stand alone comment is hardly sexual harassment... A delivery driver barely has any communication with anyone all day apart from "Hello" "Goodbye" and he was probably expecting a smile in response. He was just making chit chat and said the first thing that came to mind.

It is unfortunate that your daughter was so offended, but this type of thing is much better dealt with at the time with a response, rather than than a formal complaint to the company. Teach her to just reply "if you say so" if she must be so sensitive. I would imagine Hermes would just roll their eyes at this - and it is the drip, drip, drip of "I'm so offended" that detracts from bigger issues.

There's a female plumbing company near me. She had a female apprentice last time I saw her working.

I mean this in the nicest possible way... Has your daughter got something else going on? If it was a creepy tone or whatever I can understand it's not a nice experience but it seems like quite an overreaction to feel dirty, humiliated etc

My electrician is female. She has an all female team.