Non-Employees, Retaliation

If You See Something, Do You Fix It If It Isn’t Your Employee? 6th Circuit Applies Higher Standard to Non-Employee Harassment Case

Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP on 8/20/2025

An employee tells you a customer just harassed them — what should you do? In Bivens v. Zep, Inc. the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals charts its own course in addressing employer liability for third-party harassment. The Equal...more

Sixth Circuit Redefines Employer Liability for Client-Based Harassment

Phelps Dunbar on 8/14/2025

In an explicit departure from EEOC guidance and other federal court caselaw, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit recently held that an employer can only be liable for a client/customer’s harassment of its...more

Fifth Circuit Says Third Party Cannot Sue for Retaliation Under Title VII

Parker Poe Adams & Bernstein LLP on 8/31/2020

In its 2011 North American Stainless decision, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed that an engaged man could sue for retaliation under Title VII after he was fired around the time his fiancée filed a discrimination claim against...more

Gardner v. CLC of Pascagoula, LLC –What Constitutes “Severe and Pervasive” Conduct With Respect to “Third-Party Harassment”?

Proskauer - Law and the Workplace on 2/26/2019

Employers may be liable to their employees for harassment by non-employees under Title VII. Courts have found liability for this so-called “third-party harassment” in some of the following fact-specific contexts: waitresses...more

Non-Employees › Retaliation

If You See Something, Do You Fix It If It Isn’t Your Employee? 6th Circuit Applies Higher Standard to Non-Employee Harassment Case

Sixth Circuit Redefines Employer Liability for Client-Based Harassment

Fifth Circuit Says Third Party Cannot Sue for Retaliation Under Title VII

Gardner v. CLC of Pascagoula, LLC –What Constitutes “Severe and Pervasive” Conduct With Respect to “Third-Party Harassment”?

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