The Herald Square flagship department store made Asian customers uncomfortable by staring at them.
Macy’s flagship department store in New York City is facing a lawsuit for racially profiling Asian customers.
Quartz reports that New York-based law firm Wigdor’s filed complaint against Macy’s accuses the Manhattan department store of racial profiling and limiting their purchasing to prevent them from reselling goods online.
A plaintiff reportedly said she was once told by her manager, “don’t sell to Chinese [customers].”
She was instructed to only sell one unit of product to Asian customers. Non-Asian customers were allowed to purchase up to six of the same item. Another plaintiff said her manager told her that non-Asian customers were allowed to buy up to eight of the same item but Asian customers were only allowed “fewer than six”.
One plaintiff revealed she was not allowed to sell to the same Asian customer within 90 days of their last purchase.
Four employees were fired in April 2016 after complaining to the Macy’s union and to the managers. Three identified as Asian-American.
Employees also said Macy’s would “regularly make Asian customers uncomfortable by conspicuously staring at them through the completion of their transactions.”
The behaviour of the Macy’s managers was allegedly “based on the discriminatory stereotype that all Asian customers are resellers.”
Macy’s denied the allegations in a statement to Quartz.
“Macy’s has longstanding policies and practices that embrace and promote diversity and inclusion and prohibit discriminatory conduct against its customers, employees, vendors and business partners,” the statement said.
“We are confident that the allegations in this matter will ultimately be found to be without merit.”