_______________________________________________

               ENGROSSED SUBSTITUTE SENATE BILL 6669

          _______________________________________________

State of Washington      54th Legislature     1996 Regular Session

By Senate Committee on Labor, Commerce & Trade (originally sponsored by Senators Thibaudeau, Drew, Pelz, Smith and Kohl)

Read first time 02/02/96.

Prohibiting excessive charges for products and services because of the customer's sex.

    AN ACT Relating to excessive charges for products and services because of the customer's sex; and creating new sections.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

NEW SECTION. Sec. 1.  The legislature finds that sex discrimination in any form is unjust and intolerable, and should be eliminated wherever it occurs.  There is concern, however, that persons in this state are required to pay more for certain services solely because of their gender.  It is the intent of the legislature to identify whether and to what extent such discrimination occurs in this state so that these concerns can be appropriately addressed.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 2.  The senate labor, commerce and trade committee shall conduct an interim study to identify any services for which consumers in Washington are charged different prices based solely on the gender of the person purchasing the service.  For each service identified, the study shall determine how frequently this practice occurs, and the average amount of the price difference in each occurrence.  Price differences based specifically upon the amount of time, difficulty, or cost of providing a particular service shall not be considered.

                            --- END ---