employment dress codes & uniforms

[RainbowUnicorn]

When is a dress code not a dress code ?
When is a uniform not a uniform ?

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-38751317

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/work/te...igh-heels/

Nicola Thorp has started a petition seeking to ban workplaces from decreeing that female employees wear heels

i was having a bit ofa read and ran accross this for the second time.
it occured to me that work place safety probably prohibts the wearing of high heels on the grounds that they create undue stress and damage to the ankle, foot joints and body of the wearer.
more soo on point(excuse the pun) heels probably can not be deemed as non damaging to the point where the recomendation to wear them would not be without liability.

can the employee sue the company for ankle back knee and foot damage for having to wear heels in the work place ?

[Zinjanthropos]

she knew the way she presented herself would be key to getting work.

So why this?

But it came as something of a shock when, while working as a temp between acting gigs, she found herself turned away from a receptionist role......because - she claims - she wasn’t wearing high heels.

She's a drama school grad, might have something to do with it. Don't think she needs the heels to look good judging by her snapshot. By the way I'd say the same thing if it was a guy whining about something job related.

[C C]

can the employee sue the company for ankle back knee and foot damage for having to wear heels in the work place ?

If the plaintiff was voluntarily wearing high heels, then the potential of contributory negligence could detract from her very own lawsuit, after an accident. So a workplace requiring them is surely flirting with trouble, both in the near sense (safety / injury) and the long term (podiatric, dorsal, and other health concerns). But litigation is probably more rampant in the lawyer-flooded US than some other countries, so the fears might be curiously absent in the high-heel policies of businesses elsewhere.

Also, it's remarkable that owners, managers and organizers occasionally have to inform the enforcers in their own lower echelon staff that they don't even have a policy about high heels one way or another. Even before today's level of legal epidemics, in decades past when were they popular / widespread, stiletto heels were actually abhorred in certain buildings because of the damage they could do to the floors. So it wasn't always a pro- stance from employers directed at their female workers and customers.

[RainbowUnicorn]

can the employee sue the company for ankle back knee and foot damage for having to wear heels in the work place ?

If the plaintiff was voluntarily wearing high heels, then the potential of contributory negligence could detract from her very own lawsuit, after an accident. So a workplace requiring them is surely flirting with trouble, both in the near sense (safety / injury) and the long term (podiatric, dorsal, and other health concerns). But litigation is probably more rampant in the lawyer-flooded US than some other countries, so the fears might be curiously absent in the high-heel policies of businesses elsewhere.

Also, it's remarkable that owners, managers and organizers occasionally have to inform the enforcers in their own lower echelon staff that they don't even have a policy about high heels one way or another. Even before today's level of legal epidemics, in decades past when were they popular / widespread, stiletto heels were actually abhorred in certain buildings because of the damage they could do to the floors. So it wasn't always a pro- stance from employers directed at their female workers and customers.

stiletos i recal were banned in just about every office, except one or two food courts which i use to go to and watch all the executive secratarys have lunch.
i think there is still a very strong work place expected dress code where women are expected to wear heels. specially when visiting directors and such like clients arrive.
i have been told by several people including doctors that long term use of high heels destroys the foot.
it also can create life long back problems and knee issues.
i have met a few women who have life long dissability from wearing heels for too many years though it was the expected thing for them to wear.
point of note such people who do not conform to the undocumented dress code get fired on performance grounds fairly quickly assuming they have any form of employment law/contract protection it will just take an extra few weeks and they will not get a reference from the boss.
if they agree to move on to "something that suits them a little better" they get the reference and quietly leave & possibly get a leaving gift and a card.
as long as they play the part padded out for them by the boss.