Staff at the luxury brand that owns Cartier and pen marker Montblanc refused to use a lift with a black colleague.
Cheryl Spragg won a race harassment case after her colleagues wouldn’t get into a lift with her.
The black accountant held the doors for four co-workers but they “snubbed” her and “deliberately ignored” her as they walked on.
The rude members of staff at the upmarket Richemont UK even went as far as to pull faces to each other, an employment tribunal heard.
Ms Spragg, who is of Jamaican descent, successfully sued the firm Richemont for race harassment, race discrimination and victimisation and the two reached a "a mutually acceptable settlement" of all claims.
As if this was not bad enough, when Ms Spragg applied for a controller job, she was told there was a “preference for white continental Europeans” - experiencing racism at the firm once more.
The luxury giant, when made aware of Ms Spragg’s complaints about the lift incident, said the grievance would “take too long” and she’d be better off finding another job.
The tribunal found this was “dismissive” of the racism Ms Spragg, who began working for Richemont in 2006, faced.
HR manager Charlene Saint-Cast, who investigated the incident, even told Ms Spragg: “I might remind you that you are not the only ‘black member of staff’ within your team. No allegations of racism have ever been raised by any member of staff in the past.”
Alongside that, the four colleagues who refused to get in the lift with her claimed they were playing a “racing game” using the lifts but quickly confessed they weren’t when confronted with CCTV of the incident.
The London Richemont office was rife with ‘casual racism’, one Malaysian Chinese worker claimed at the tribunal.
The incident took place in May 2016 when senior credit controller Byron Burgess and accounts workers Sara Decort, Divya Patel, and Beata Grzegorcyk-Rapacewicz approached the lifts.
But when the lift arrived, the group walked past the lift single-file and Ms Patel was caught on CCTV turning around and “pulling a face with a wide-open mouth”, and the tribunal was told Mr Burgess made a “whipping noise”.
All of them admitted at the London tribunal they saw Ms Spragg holding the door open for them.
Ms Spragg called this “bullying and ostracism” and raised it in a grievance in December 2016, saying she was the only black member of staff at the lift, and they decided not to get in the lift with her, and they behaved with “total disregard” for her feelings.
It was then when she raised the grievance.
Employment Judge Tina Elliott said: “We find that Mr Burgess was the ringleader. He led the single-file procession past the lift, and the others were following him.
“He was the most senior of the four employees. We find that the three women followed his lead. Mr Burgess accepts that at no time has he apologised to [Ms Spragg], even after seeing the footage.”
Ms Spragg raised the incident a second time, in January 2017, which was investigated by then global HR director Caroline Welch-Ballentine.
The tribunal found Ms Welch-Ballentine was “not sufficiently open minded” and “she did not probe matters with [Ms Spragg] and was content to accept the finding that had already been made, despite the footage showing differently”.
Ms Spragg was told to stop contacting HR and to delete the CCTV footage, or she would face disciplinary action, which the tribunal ruled as an act of victimisation.
In addition, Ms Spragg experienced “disproportionate” covert surveillance into her personal life by having her picture taken when Managing Director Kevin Boltman saw her outside of work in May 2017, when she was off work with a bad back.
Regarding the lift incident, Employment Judge Elliott concluded: “The actions of Mr Burgess were because of race. We have found that the three more junior women were just following his lead.
“He could not say why he acted as he did. We have drawn an adverse inference that this was because of race. [Ms Spragg] was the only black employee present on that occasion.
“We find she was snubbed by the other four when she held the lift door open for them, and they walked past her in single file, in Mr Burgess’s case making a strange movement and, in Ms Patel’s case pulling a face.
“We find this was conduct which was violating to her dignity. It was offensive and humiliating.”
Judge Elliott also said there was a ‘lack of sensitivity’ in dealing with Ms Spragg’s complaints: “We found a lack of sensitivity on this discrimination complaint.
“We find that the respondent was incredulous that anyone could complain about race discrimination. It had never happened before.
“Yet this came from an HR professional, in a team of HR professionals, including at the very top, who had never received any training on equality and diversity, and it was not a racially diverse HR team.”
A Richemont spokesman said: “In 2019 we and Ms Spragg reached a mutually acceptable settlement of all claims. No further comment will be made.
“At Richemont, we strive hard to be a multicultural, racially and ethnically diverse employer, with teams spanning cultures and nationalities across the globe.
"We mounted a review of everything we do in this area after the case... We have always believed in diversity, equity and inclusion and after this tribunal reported their judgement - almost four years ago - we ensure those beliefs remain at our core.”
