A senior car saleswoman sued for sex discrimination by claiming that her boss referred to the pair of them as ‘Beauty and the Beast’.
Hanan Gendi complained that her manager Mark Brown compared her to Belle from the Disney classic and him to the Beast, a tribunal heard.
Miss Gendi, general sales manager at a West London Volvo dealership, alleged that Mr Brown made the comparison to the 1991 movie during a meeting with other managers.
She also accused Mr Brown of ‘pressuring’ her to take part in a photoshoot and saying she was ‘better looking’ in front of staff.
Miss Gendi took allegations of sex discrimination and harassment and race discrimination and harassment to an employment tribunal.
But, she has lost her case after the tribunal found that her claims were not true.
The tribunal, held at London Central Empolyment Tribunal, heard that Miss Gendi worked for Endeavour Automotive as a general sales manager from October 2022.
She was based at Endeavour’s West London Volvo branch.
The general manager claimed that the month she started work, Mr Brown referred to her ‘as beauty and himself as the beast during a general manager meeting’.
Miss Gendi also accused Mr Brown of ‘pressurising’ her a few months later, in January 2023, to take part in a ‘public press activity’.
Hanan Gendi complained that her manager Mark Brown compared her to Belle from the Disney classic and him to the Beast, a tribunal heard. Pictured Central London Employment Tribunal in Victory House
The January 2023 edition of Auto Express magazine features Miss Gendi in a photoshoot talking about an electric SUV.
She told the tribunal that Mr Brown told her ‘she was better looking in front of staff’.
Miss Gendi said that she ‘declined the opportunity presented to her’.
The tribunal said: ‘This constitutes an inconsistency with her pleaded case and her written statement.
‘She went on to say that she did not like social media and was steadfast in her position that she felt that she had been pressured into doing something that she did not want to do.
‘She was clear that it was Mr Brown that had forced her to do this.’
The tribunal was told there were concerns about Miss Gendi’s performance and conduct at work, including her team ‘consistently’ missing targets.
She was also ‘unable or unwilling to price up used cars’ and there were ‘significant concerns’ about her ‘people management skills’.
Miss Gendi had a meeting with Mr Brown in March 2023, in which her performance was discussed.
Her manager accused her of being ‘very argumentative and confrontational’ from the start of the meeting, and the following day she raised a grievance which among other allegations claimed that Mr Brown was misogynistic.
However, she did not mention either the beauty and the beast incident or the press incident. Miss Gendi told the tribunal that that was because ‘it was not her biggest concern at the time’.
Her grievance was dismissed in April 2023, and she appealed against this decision.
Miss Gendi was sacked the same month for a number of reasons, including the ‘breakdown of fundamental work relationships’.
On the beauty and the beast allegation, Employment Judge Bellamy Forde found: ‘[Miss Gendi] also accepted in evidence that she had no corroborating evidence of this allegation.
‘The tribunal finds this allegation unproven on the balance of probabilities.
‘In other words, [Miss Gendi] has not proven to the required standard of proof that Mr Brown referred to her as beauty and himself as beast.
‘Accordingly, it fails to pass the evidential test set out in [the Equality Act,] meaning that we do not find it to be an allegation that could be considered to be discriminatory.’
Judge Forde also said it was ‘likely that [Miss Gendi] would have been a willing and capable participant in the media activity that she was tasked with’.
‘Further, we do not find on the balance of probabilities that Mr. Brown described [Miss Gendi] in the way that she says he did,’ the judge said.
‘Accordingly, this allegation is not proven.’
All of Miss Gendi’s other claims were dismissed.
