Ops #4 - Phone Sex

I was swapping business stories with a friend the other day and after about the fourth one they suggested I include them in my blog.  She said "you have a hundred of these stories and other people would enjoy hearing them, especially if they illustrate a point you are making in another posting".  So here is the first one.  I don't think it illustrates any particular point, but it is kind of amusing.  Yes, each story related actually happened and is accurate as best I can remember.

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In the mid 1990's, I was the GM for a plant of a building products company located in a southern state.  I was sitting at my desk when the HR Manager asked to speak with me.  She wanted to let me know that an employee had let her know that our new receptionist of about two months, who was young and attractive, was having what the employee called "phone sex" with customers.  "Wow, that is a pretty serious accusation" I said. 

The receptionist sits behind a window to the lobby where there were frequently visitors waiting for someone in the company, or filling out an employment application.  The receptionist reported to the HR Manager.

I asked the HR Manager to look into the complaint and let me know what she found.  She came back an hour later and told me the following.  "I stood in the hallway outside the door to the reception area where she couldn't see me and listened to her taking phone calls.  After a few that were uneventful, I got an ear full of very graphic language between her and the person on the other end of the line that went on for several minutes.  I'm sure anyone in the lobby could hear it too."  The HR Manager then went on to detail how she had confronted the receptionist, and learned that the person on the other end of the line was a married distributor of our products, who was "just having some fun".  It turned out that he wasn't the only person who was having this type of fun with the receptionist, although it never went further than conversations on the phone.

So I asked the HR Manager how she wanted to handle the situation, since the receptionist reported to her.  She thought about it for a few seconds and said "I'll talk to her about it".  To this I responded, "good idea, and while your talking about it with her, make sure the words "your fired" come out of your mouth".

 Yes, this really happened.  How would you have handled it differently?  What factors would you consider in making a decision on how to respond to this situation?