Abercrombie & Fitch fined for refusing to let teen help autistic sister

[christiangirl]

Originally Posted by KSigkid

But, the other side to that is this...the company admits their mistake, the mom drops the DHS thing, and still files the lawsuit after A&F admits they did something wrong.

From a PR perspective, I'd like to think there's a way they could have apologized without an admission of guilt. I went through a whole media relations training on that subject, I just can't remember the specifics, haha.

Exactly. People do this all the time in arguments, even kids. "I'm so sorry for the way this all turned out and I wish it had been different." Read: "I refuse to apologize for any of the crap I did, but I don't want you to dropkick me into next week so I'll say this instead."

[KSig RC]

Originally Posted by christiangirl

Exactly. People do this all the time in arguments, even kids. "I'm so sorry for the way this all turned out and I wish it had been different." Read: "I refuse to apologize for any of the crap I did, but I don't want you to dropkick me into next week so I'll say this instead."

"We apologize that our employees followed our own rules and their training to the letter - while what the employee did violated the spirit of the rules, we do not expect our associates to be able to make a snap decision on something as subtle and complex as autism, and neither should you, hence why we make the rules black-and-white (hopefully that analogy does not violate any sort of Federal act). Next time, make sure the child has a visible handicap, so we can avoid all of this posturing and even our gray-collar staff can figure this out. Be safe, and wear pre-torn jeans. One love, Abercrombie and/or Fitch."

A&F doesn't exactly have a great reputation for handling litigation, but even I'm not entirely sure they should offer any sort of olive branch when their theory is that they did nothing wrong.

[KSigkid]

Originally Posted by christiangirl

Exactly. People do this all the time in arguments, even kids. "I'm so sorry for the way this all turned out and I wish it had been different." Read: "I refuse to apologize for any of the crap I did, but I don't want you to dropkick me into next week so I'll say this instead."

But even that type of apology gets iffy, for the reasons discussed by Kevin, KSigRC and others. When you deal with litigation, you have to be VERY careful about what you say. Something that would seem like an obvious statement in other situations (like an argument between children) can take on a whole other importance in a litigation or pre-litigation situation.