Temporary workers at Amazon.com's UK fulfilment centres risk being terminated if they call in sick and are required to work seven days a week, according to a report published on Sunday in the The Times.
Employees reportedly get only two short breaks during an eight-hour shift and must request permission to use the toilet. The temporary employees hired to handle the seasonal increase in business earn £6.30 an hour but must pay £8.50 a day to take a bus to the warehouse if they can't arrange their own transportation, the newspaper reported.
Employees are also penalised for not achieving what one manager called "ridiculous" packing quotas, and are often required to walk up to 14 miles during the course of a shift to retrieve items for shipping, according to a reporter who went undercover at Amazon's Bedfordshire warehouse.
Amazon did not deny the report. Allan Lyall, vice president of European operations for Amazon, responded to the report in a statement printed with the article: "Every single member of the Amazon.co.uk workforce... is currently working flat out to ensure that our millions of customers receive the products that they have ordered on time this Christmas. Our number-one focus is our customers and everyone at Amazon works hard on their behalf."
Apparently it's well known that being a holiday temp is the only way to get a full-time job with the company, and competition is fierce.
"Demand for permanent roles from our temporary employees is at such a high level that we no longer need to recruit externally for permanent positions. Indeed, we have already seen well over 100 temporary employees become permanent this year alone," said Lyall.
"During 2008, we have taken on over 4,000 temporary fulfilment-centre associates in the UK and are benefitting from the lowest level of employees leaving the company that we have experienced over all our 11 Christmases," he added.
Representatives for the company in the US did not immediately respond to requests for comment, but spokeswoman Patty Smith told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer that there were "inaccuracies" in The Times' report.
"Don't believe everything you read," Smith said via email. "There were many inaccuracies in the UK article. Case in point: We don't allow [fulfilment centre] associates to work more than six days a week in any location — they must have at least one day off."
