Amazon and its factories and distribution centres have previously come under fire for the way they treat staff, just last week we heard a story about how many ambulances have been called to distribution centres and staff woes and mistreatment has been an ongoing issue.
Now an investigation has brought to light that agency workers making the Amazon’s Echo Smart Speakers and Kindles in China have been hired and paid illegally!
The retailer confirmed that independent auditors visited the Foxconn factory earlier this year and uncovered the two issues of concern and have requested a corrective action plan that Amazon must follow. The auditor did not reveal what the concern was but the Observer claim that the factory had hired an illegal high number of agency workers to get out of paying them overtime pay, sick pay or holiday.
China’s labour laws state that these dispatch workers should only by law make up 10% of the workforce but at Foxconn they made up 40% of all staff. Further to this, when the staff were working overtime, they were only paid normal hourly rate and not paid the time and a half required both by Chinese law and by Amazon’s own code of conduct.
Amazon has responded to the findings to state that they recognise their responsibility to the wellbeing of factory workers manufacturing products for Amazon and that they have a corrective action plan in place to resolve these issues.
Whatever happens, it must be said that Amazon is tied often to these claims of poor workers conditions in its factories and it seems that this is something the company need to work on to be sustainable in the future.
10 of 2024’s Most Anticipated Reads
The For Reading Addicts Book of the Year 2023
Birmingham Poet, Benjamin Zephaniah dies, aged 65
Top Authors Join Legal Battle Against OpenAI for Mass Copyright Infringement
New Children’s Book Reveals the Black History of the UK