Amazon's Relentless Worker Churn
axios.com
axios.com
Sometimes the scanning machines they used glitched, causing the system to erroneously report that they were 'idle' for 15 minutes. This inevitably resulted in a scolding from their manager, or even a formal warning on their record. Managers always believed the automated systems over employees.
He was studying part-time, and every single time he was given permission to take a day off for an exam, whether paid or unpaid, the system mistakenly marked him as absent and added 'points' to his record. He often had to spend hours of personal time on the phone with HR to get these points removed. Accumulating a certain number of points meant being fired automatically.
'Our systems make mistakes that affect your present and future opportunities in mere seconds with no human presence - Now that's what I call efficiency!'
People, please don't do this. It is not YOUR responsibility to eat this cost. This should have been paid for time.
There is a fundamental problem with warehouse employees being viewed as expendable, but most of the problems we’ve heard about seem to be infrastructure related, understaffing, and communication related.
If they keep at it they might pull themselves out of last place. But without fundamental shifts in approach I don’t see them becoming better than a not terrible place or even mediocre to work.