“We are forced to work for straight ten hours, standing on our foot, without any seating arrangement. If we fail to do so, we are fired within moments,” says Manju Goel, a C-Return (employees who process the items returned by customers) worker at Amazon’s Manesar warehouse.
She is amongst the many staffers employed with the ecommerce giant who are demanding equitable labour rights at the company. What’s more, their voice is not limited to India; its echoes can be heard globally as part of the ‘Make Amazon Pay’ protest that took place worldwide during Black Friday weekend in November 2023.
For the past four years, Amazon warehouse employees globally have been participating in this campaign. The global outcry is gathering momentum with claims do the rounds that the Jeff Bezos-owned-companyoffers workers minimal incentives for several hours of labour.
This year too, the ‘Make Amazon Pay’ protest was co-convened by UNI Global Union and the Progressive International, on 24th of November to coincide with Black Friday, when retail sales in most geographies seek a major uptick. Demonstrations took place in 15 countries, including Brazil, United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, Spain, France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Italy, Poland, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Australia and India.
In India, Amazon warehouse workers held protests in New Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Patna, Varanasi, Aurangabad, Bhopal, Rishikesh, Agra and Kolhapur. Predominantly aged between 18 and 30, they are often employed on contractual basis, spanning three to 11 months. With most of them hailing from lower-income brackets, they were demanding for humane working conditions alongside reasonable compensation.
Lending A Voice
Amazon recently revealed that its third-quarter revenue rose by 13 per cent to $143.1 billion. At a summit held in United Kingdom, on 27th October, Christy Hoffman, general secretary of UNI Global Union said that the company’s business model destroys the environment and crushes small business, leaving behind a monopoly without ethics or accountability.
“Last year, the coalition organised over 135 strikes and protests across 35 countries on Black Friday. This year, Amazon is set to face even more disruption, as workers withdraw their labour, activists protest Amazon Web Services’ environmentally destructive practices, citizens demand the company pay its taxes and small businesses and independent booksellers condemn the giant’s anti-competitive behaviour,” she added.
Speaking at the Summit virtually, US senator Bernie Sanders tore into the company saying, “No company is a better poster child for the corporate greed and arrogance that we are seeing in the U.S., the UK and throughout the world than Amazon.This is a company that is worth over $1.3 trillion, not billion, not million. $1.3 trillion. This is a company that made over $12 billion in profits last year. This is a company that spent over 6 billion last year not to improve the lives of their workers or to make its warehouses safer, but on stock buybacks to make its wealthy stockholders even richer. This is a company that spent over $14 million on anti-union consultants and lawyers to prevent Amazon workers from joining a union or signing a first contract.”
Call For Action Across The Globe
The public outcry gathered steam on various social media platforms where people observed that the company continues to achieve its targets while putting at stake the physical and mental wellbeing of its workers. During, and since, the pandemic, there has been a significant surge in the number of orders placed on its platforms. But many say that this has not translated in equal investment in safety measures, leaving employees vulnerable to the risks of injury and illness.
Amazon employees in the UK and the US, where labour laws are more stringent than in India, have been complaining of ill-treatment and poor wages on social media. This year in Germany, Prime Day witnessed strikes at ten warehouses throughout the country, coordinated by the Ver.di union.
In the United States, Amazon delivery drivers successfully established the first-ever drivers' union in collaboration with the Teamsters, implementing rolling pickets to advocate for improved pay, job safety, and union acknowledgment. In Dhaka, Bangladeshi garment workers have initiated widespread protests, calling for a monthly minimum wage of $209, an elimination of police harassment that has resulted in the deaths of trade unionists, and urging Amazon to commit to the Accord on Fire and Building Safety.
Workplace Welfare Takes A Backseat
While many corporates are rolling out the red carpet to ensure gender diversity, things appear to be different at Amazon’s warehouses. Complaining of poor working conditions and workplace harassment, women workers here are demanding adequate safety facilities, including places to rest and change.
“The working conditions are very poor. Womensuffer more, because we can’t take more than 5 minutes restroom break even while menstruating; otherwise, our IDs are locked or there is a pay cut. Amazon expects us to go through stages of documentation while hiring but doesn’t take a minute in firing,” adds Manju fumed, while throwing light on the poor state of the employees working at Amazon warehouses.
Another worker at the same warehouse said that while there are around 2000 people, there are barely 100 chairs. “How can we rest even for a while? We are not robots, but they expect us to process 150 items in an hour. Failure to do so leads to additional salary cuts. We are expected to work even if we fall sick.”
“We are hired through a due process, but fired over small issues mid-month and don’t even receive the settlement dues. There needs to strict laws for termination, and we should be given at least one month’s notice period,” said a worker at the company’s Bilaspur Road warehouse.
Another worker said under conditions of anonymity, “We are under surveillance all throughout. We can’t take breaks in between, and since there is no network in the warehouses,we can’t use our phones. The work pressure is such that we don’t know what’s happening outside the warehouse and are forced to work for hours and do overtime if targets are not achieved.” Manju concurred that gender-based slurs are also thrown at workers in public if they don’t meet their targets, which is dehumanising.
Ram Avtar, a labour/associate Problem Solver at the same facility alleged that he was unlawfully terminated without any due reason or notice or receiving payment of retrenchment compensation and other dues in accordance with law. He has appealed before the assistant labour commissioner, Gurugram through his representative Adv Rahul Kumar Sharma, to re-instate his service with full wages and the previously held salaries which were denied to him.
Dr Ajay Kummar Pandey, advocate at the Supreme Court of India states that complaints about violation of labour rights should be addressed to the labour commissioner.“The allegations against a giant like Amazon is not in the best interest of industrial relations between the employee and employee and it must be investigated on priority basis and due action should be taken,” he said adding that workers should also check their contracts as they are often fooled into lucrative work offers by third party recruiters, which is a common case in Amazon’s warehouse workers recruitment.
Dr Pandey added that permanent workers and contractual workers often have different laws according to the labour laws in India. Ram Avtar’s case is being dealt under the Section 2(A) of the Industrial Dispute Act, 1947, which regulates the Indian labour law for trade unions and individual workman employed in any industry in the Indian mainland. The case would have been dealt with differently in case of permanent employment.
Big Brother’s Always Watching
The workers also claimed that the tenets of the Minimum Wages Act 1948 are not adhered to at Amazon’s Indian warehouses. Dharmendra Kumar, convener of Amazon India Workers Association said that according to the country’s labour laws, daily work hours can’t exceed more than eight hours, and 48 hours a week. If at all, work is being taken, the workers must be paid for the overtime.
“Here, the workers are working for 10 hours daily at a very meagre pay, without proper breaks while it is mandated that there should be no continuous work and a 30-minute interval. However, Amazon doesn’t want to follow these. The workers have pledged their demands in a petition to the Amazon India heads and the Labour Ministry and we are trying to ensure decent working conditions for the staffers,” he said.
Amazon India’s employees have also put forth their petition at campaigning platform Jhatkaa.org and have forwarded it to the labour ministry as well. A small victory was achieved when warehouse employees being eligible to receive Rs 5000 as part of Covid-19 compensation.
Rajendra Acharya, regional secretary, UNI Global Union Asia and Pacific emphasised in a statement that the global increase in protests by Amazon workerscalls for accountability. He asserted that all workers, whether directly hired or through third-party agencies, deserve fair wages and decent working conditions and that the focus is on the need for Amazon to adhere to labour laws in India by providing permanent jobs with decent working conditions for all workers.
This year, Amazon agreed to pay severance packages to several warehouse workers in a seller services facility located in Sonepat, after their protests and strikes. These workers, employed through a staffing agency, were left jobless after the facility was closed.
Officials from Amazon India also disputed the allegations. “The fact is Amazon has created millions of good jobs, while helping create and support hundreds of thousands of small businesses around the world. We offer great pay and benefits for our employees, with great career opportunities, and provide a modern and safe working environment for all. We continue to invest in the countries and communities where we operate,” the company informed Outlook Start-Up.
