By clothing-bag, 18/07/2022

Rebellion at the funeral home: the workers rise against the skirt and mandatory heel

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Several female receptionists at Servisa, the Seguros Ocaso funeral home, are in an open battle against their company for forcing them to wear skirts and shoes with a 9-centimeter heel, unlike their male colleagues who can wear pants and flat shoes.

Vanesa S., an employee at the Valencia branch, reached an agreement in 2019 in which it was written that the staff could choose between wearing "pants or a skirt" and wearing "flat shoes or high-heeled shoes."

For this, it was necessary to reach the Labor Arbitration Court of the community, which issued a resolution reviewed by this newspaper.

"But the company continues with the same policy", explains Vanesa to 'El Periódico de España'. "One of my colleagues asked for pants and they gave her a skirt, claiming that there were none. When the colleagues from other delegations complain, they are told that they are the only ones. I personally take care that all the new people know that this document exists, because I It seems unfair. I also find out whether or not they have paid for the socks and I get them to do so."

Servicios Especiales S.A, the full name of the company, has funeral homes in 43 Spanish cities and employs more than 600 people. He has not responded to several requests for information from this newspaper.

As usual in the sector, the company provides service to Ocaso policyholders, clients who have taken out death insurance or "insurance for the dead".

The geographical dispersion of the workforce and the diversity of labor agreements (each province has its own and some do not) limit the organizational capacity of the workers. But the season is already open.

"The war against skirts and heels began in Valencia. Vanesa was on leave due to harassment, so when I filed my lawsuit I thought: they are going to whore me. I was not a union delegate," explains Sara M., a former worker from the Huelva funeral home.

Servisa workers with the mandatory uniform

/ EPE

Sara's case will go to court. She was fired after suing Servisa for sexual discrimination and calling union elections, since in Huelva they still did not have a committee. The company forced her to wear a heel despite presenting a medical report about her herniated disc.

In the conciliation act of this first lawsuit, the lawyer got Servisa to commit in writing to give Sara pants and flat shoes.

"I filed the lawsuit in November 2020, already on leave due to depression [caused by work]. I reinstated in February and twenty days later they fired me for lack of contractual good faith," he says. "In that short stay I set up a union section and collected signatures to call elections, being the only candidate. That made them feel bad: on top of the fact that I'm suing them, I'm calling union elections. My lawyer told me to sign not in agreement." This cause is waiting to be resolved.

Nine centimeter heels

Vanesa, the employee from Valencia, places the beginning of the problems in the arrival of a manager, José Antonio de la Fuente, at Servisa's central offices. For a few months, De la Fuente has not worked at the company.

"I am one of the oldest girls, I have been here since 2009. At that time there were only two delegations with receptionists and the protocol was not so rigorous. We wore pants and any shoe we wanted, according to the uniform. In Valencia we had a director woman. She was wearing dresses and heels, but she let us get by," she explains.

In this delegation there is a committee, of which Sara is a delegate.

"When he arrived in 2016, he implemented the uniform throughout the company. They changed our shoes and, surprise, it had a thin and high heel. I refused. We spend a lot of time on our feet and a heel like that hurts. He, With bad milk, he told me that he had tried it on and that it was very comfortable. He told us that it stylized us. And the skirt is very uncomfortable, it goes up and you have to keep lowering it, "he continues. "I spoke with colleagues from other funeral homes and only Servisa forces women to wear skirts and heels."

Uniform regulations in Servisa

/ EPE

Vanesa was informed before taking legal action. The collective agreement for undertakers in Valencia does not distinguish between male and female workers' clothing.

"I wanted to remove that stigma that women can only wear a skirt. That's when a campaign of harassment and demolition began that ended with me taking leave due to anxiety," she adds. "Being the union leader and not one pass, they came for me."

Among other situations, she explains that she was coerced by a manager who insisted that the company did what he said and that, when he offered her a change of department, she asked to be a driver and was told "where had you seen a woman driving a hearse".

The staff, as can be seen in the company's official accounts, is very male: there are 525 men and 154 women, most of them receptionists.

"Of twelve years in the company, I have been enduring vexatious situations for seven", he continues. "I plucked up my courage and filed a collective complaint. The lawyer believed that it was the best formula to win the situation, because in my delegation there are more women who were forced to sign a paper giving up pants."

It was this complaint that ended in a labor arbitration, a hearing with moderators to mediate between the parties. Vanesa says that the company insisted that it did not discriminate based on gender nor did the heels have 9 centimeters.

"I said, wait a minute. They didn't count on me having the shoes with me. I reached down and pulled the heel out and the judge threw his head in his hands," he says.

Heels that Servisa workers are forced to wear

/ EPE

With her resolution, Vanesa managed to ensure that her fellow men also benefited. "Everyone has their problems. If my teammates need another type of shoe that is more comfortable, they can ask for it," she says.

The agreement indicates that the company will pay the amount of the shoe —within some approved models— in case the worker does not take the one provided by it.

The Spanish Justice has already handed down several sentences that consider differentiated uniforms between men and women discriminatory.

The Supreme Court ruled in 2011 that the imposition of "cap, apron with dungarees, skirt and stockings" to the nurses and assistants of the Hospital of Cádiz, "without the possibility of opting for sanitary pajamas" for men was discriminatory.

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Likewise, the Superior Court of Justice of Madrid ruled in favor in 2015 of a National Heritage guide who had been suspended from employment and salary for refusing to wear heels at work.

Rectification requested by Servisa

On December 30 —six days after the publication of this article and thirteen days after the first contact established by 'El Periódico de España' with the company—, Servisa requested to exercise his right of rectification by burofax.

We reproduce said rectification below:

- That Sara was subject to a disciplinary dismissal that has nothing to do with the request she made months before regarding uniformity.

- That the disciplinary dismissal is prior to the CGT Huelva union appointing her Secretary of the Union Section in the Company, since in fact Sara belonged to the Unitary Union of Huelva when she was dismissed.

- That all women workers at Servisa can opt for a skirt or pants as well as high-heeled or flat shoes.

- That in the Servisa funeral home in Huelva, a Works Committee has been set up for years, whose members are directly elected by the workers of the Center.



Despite Servisa's clarification, this newspaper wishes to reiterate that it contacted the company on several occasions (by phone and sending two emails, one of them with several specific questions, on December 17 and 20, 2021) to order to include his version in the article, without receiving any response.