Does the Eida Allow Female Food Employees Or Not?

According to Ynet the Eida Hachareidis kashrus organization has a rule, perhaps unwritten, that restaurants and food establishments under their supervision cannot employ females. The reporter dressed Haredi and tried to get jobs at Eida establishments in Jerusalem, Beitar and Bnei Braq and was repeatedly rejected and told by the establishments that the Eida does not allow them to hire female employees. A number of times she was told that women cannot work in food establishments and instead she should try to get a job in one of the clothing stores where women can and do work.
The explanations given included:
 - Haredi male customers come for food an drink and cannot speak to women. (I am wondering, how do the male employees converse with female customers?)
 - they aren't able to because in the past it has led to not good things happening..
 - men and women aren't allowed to work together..
 - it is a Haredi neighborhood - how would you work here?
She was told things like this by both manager, employees and owners, and they all blamed the Badatz Eida for this rule, even if they themselves would have no problem with, or even prefer, female employees. Of course they added it is a matter of business, and if they drop the hechsher to hire women, they will lose all their customers.
The Eida responded, in the article, that food establishments under the supervision of the Eida around the country employ hundreds of women from all streams and sectors in a variety of roles. The policies conveyed in the article are not representative of the policies of the Badatz.
Besides for the Eida response, the entire thing sounds like a redux of the Ethiopian employees of the winery situation.
So, we have businesses in 3 cities claiming the Eida doesn't allow them to hire women, and we have the Eida saying they allow businesses to hire women, and many do so. Someone is lying. For the storekeepers it might just be an easy answer to not hire someone and blame it on the Eida. For the Eida's claim, it should be easy enough to check - go into a bunch of Eida-supervised restaurants and food establishments and see how many employ women. I guess every establishment this reporter went into did not have female employees. The Eida restaurants (all pizza shops) in my area do not have female employees. Does anybody know
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