Harassment & Reporting: Best Practices

Simpay has clear policies and procedures in place to ensure that our workplace is free from harassment.

Harassment Defined

Harassment is defined in this policy as unwelcome verbal, visual, or physical conduct creating an intimidating, an offensive or a hostile work environment that interferes with work performance. Harassment can be verbal (including slurs, jokes, insults, epithets, gestures, or teasing), visual (including offensive posters, symbols, cartoons, drawings, computer displays, text messages, social media, or e-mails), or physical conduct (including physically threatening another, blocking someone's way, etc.) that denigrates or shows hostility or aversion toward an individual because of any protected characteristic. Such conduct violates this policy, even if it is not unlawful. Because it is difficult to define unlawful harassment, employees are expected to behave at all times in a manner consistent with the intended purpose of this policy.

Reporting Procedures

The following steps have been put into place to ensure the work environment is respectful, professional, and free of discrimination, harassment, and retaliation.

If an employee believes someone has violated this policy or the Equal Employment Opportunity Policy, the employee should promptly bring the matter to the immediate attention of the Head of Human Resources. If this individual is the person toward whom the complaint is directed, the employee should contact any higher-level manager in the reporting chain. If the employee makes a complaint under this policy and has not received a satisfactory response within five business days, any member of management should be contacted immediately. Every manager who learns of any employee's concern about conduct in violation of this policy or the Equal Employment Opportunity Policy, whether in a formal complaint or informally, or who otherwise is aware of conduct in violation of this policy, or our Equal Employment Opportunity Policy must immediately report the issues raised to the Head of Human Resources.

Training & Resources

All Simpayans are required to undergo harassment prevention training as required by applicable law. Simpay typically provides companywide training annually, each March. For more information about this training requirement, visit https://calcivilrights.ca.gov/shpt/.

Simpay's employee handbook is available here, if you want to read the full policy and procedures.

All forms of discrimination, harassment, and retaliation are unacceptable in the workplace and in any work-related settings such as business trips and business-related social functions, regardless of whether the conduct is engaged in by a manager, a coworker, a client, a customer, a vendor, or another third party.

Reach out at any time to your Human Resources team if you have any questions.