Amazon deletes anti-union listing, watches workers’ “secret” social groups
Amazon is keeping a watchful eye on workers, lest they try to become organized. …
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Amazon is working extremely hard to counter both internal unionization efforts and external bad press even as working conditions for its Flex drivers seem to get ever more desperate amid the persistent pandemic, a set of new reports reveals.
The Internet’s biggest everything store has been busy during the COVID-19 pandemic. As in-person retail bottomed out, online retail skyrocketed and Amazon hired an additional 175,000 warehouse, grocery, and delivery workers to keep up with the sharply increased demand this year provided.
One of the ways Amazon gets packages to your doorstep is through Amazon Flex. The program is basically like Uber, but for Amazon: drivers use Amazon’s app and their own cars to collect packages from Amazon facilities and deliver them to local homes. Typically, drivers sign up for a scheduled two-to-four-hour delivery block or shift, but Flex also makes “Instant Offers,” which are immediate, on-demand deliveries drivers can pick up like an Uber or Lyft fare.
Competition for those Instant Offers in some markets is so intense that some drivers are apparently trying a novel workaround, Bloomberg News reports: they’re sticking phones in trees.
The trees in question are outside Amazon facilities and Whole Foods stores in greater Chicago, Bloomberg explains. The devices in the branches monitor Amazon’s dispatch services for an available offer, and when one is made, they register as “closest.” They sync with
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