Faust had surgery July 20 and reported to the Amazon warehouse with a doctor’s note saying she could return to work Aug. 17. When she arrived to deliver the note within a week of her surgery, she found out the doctor’s note wasn’t necessary.
“They said my assignment with them is terminated. I was just flabbergasted,” Faust said. “I devoted nearly a year of my life trying to get a job and that whole time was a waste. They kept me on and kept me on until I handed in that medical paper, and they said, ‘See ya.’ “
That was after the company started getting visits from OSHA.
The Morning Call also notes the relationship between a temp company called Integrity Staffing Solutions and Amazon. ISS does a lot of work for Amazon but doesn’t show up much in previous press clippings in Factiva:
ISS recruits temporary workers for positions at Amazon warehouses throughout the country. Recent job postings on the company’s website include positions in Hazleton, Delaware, Indiana, Kentucky, Phoenix, Ariz., Las Vegas and Reno, Nev…
ISS has supervisors stationed in the Amazon warehouse to manage temporary workers, so contact between temporary employees and Amazon managers is minimal.
I’d like to read more about that company and its relationship with Amazon.
Another thing worth noting about this story is that it shows a newspaper taking on one of its hometown’s biggest employers at a time when jobs are scarce. That’s worth some points.
This, of course, is not just a Pennsylvania story. If this, and the Hershey’s fiasco last month, can happen in a relatively pro-labor state, what’s going on in the rest of the country?
So this is a call to all you reporters out there in Amazon towns. How does Amazon treat its workers in your town? Is Allentown a one-off or is this a systemic problem within the company?
You need to read Amazon's response that was issued today. Amazon spent 2.4 million dollars installing industrial strength AC units in 4 FC's last summer. Must have caused quite a clamor! The units were fully functonal by August. The story broke on September 20th. Did the reporter not know about the AC units by that time, or did he know and ignore? Is there other information that he selectively ignored? This sure makes me wonder about his credibility.
He is making a big name for himself on this story, though. Why do you take the word of disgruntled employees over Amazon? Is there some kind of bias....
#1 Posted by SueDonym, CJR on Fri 23 Sep 2011 at 09:09 PM
Yeah 2.4 million after being investigated by OSHA, for a LLC that has managed to evade tax liabilities this is a drop in the bucket compared to the possibility of a class action suit, its a sweat shop, this company continues to degrade itself vigrously
#2 Posted by Ron Speiser, CJR on Sat 24 Sep 2011 at 12:44 AM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqI0zjn_480&feature=related
#3 Posted by Peter Pumpkin Eater, CJR on Sat 24 Sep 2011 at 12:47 AM
I had my son quit work at amazon in allentown due to this article. He said it was a great place. But i believed the paper. BIG MISTAKE.
TODAY - September 24, the same PAPER THE MORNING CALL, named Amazon the BEST PLACE TO WORK - Warehouse in the LEHIGH VALLEY. OMG - I kid you not. Please don't make the mistake I made and believe the LIAR SPENCER SOPER. Someone needs to be held accountable for the damage of this article. How can a paper say one week a company is worst and the next they are BEST. HOW CAN THEY BE ALLOWED TO DO THIS. THE MORNING CALL SHOULD BE INVESTIGATED.
Amazon named BEST PLACE TO WORK by Morning Call. Readers Choice 2011. Over 100000 voted last year. I'll believe the readers and not a few disgruntled lazy workers and a LIAR reporter. Oh this reporter only usually does articles about how to save money. His last was about a stars wars character and Kittly litter and HE DRESSES IN DRAG> I kid you not. He is a LIAR>
#4 Posted by Mary Moore, CJR on Sat 24 Sep 2011 at 02:59 PM
So now you're entitled to air conditioning on the job?
What's next? Aroma therapy?
Nobody's putting a gun to anyone's head, forcing anyone to work at Amazon.
When I was a kid, I installed wiring all summer in 130 degree attics. My parent's house didn't have air conditioning. My school didn't have air conditioning. Our car didn't have air conditioning.
50 years of commie/liberalism has reduced much of this nation to whiny, lazy dependent underclass.
Pititful... Truly pitiful...
#5 Posted by padikiller, CJR on Sat 24 Sep 2011 at 03:37 PM
Sue Donym, if you actually read the Morning Call article you'll see that the reporter notes multiple times that Amazon and its temp staffing company both refused to answer any specific questions, despite being given 3 weeks prior to the article's publication to do so. Don't you think if they'd given the reporter the AC info and he hadn't mentioned it, that omission would have been complained about in Amazon's press release about the AC installation?
As for the conditions in which everyone should be able to work, Amazon doesn't hire only teenagers to work in their warehouses. They have workers in their 50s and 60s. I invite those wistful for the good old days to take up a job running around a 115 degree warehouse, required to move at least one item from point A to point B every 30 seconds, and see how you do.
#6 Posted by PG, CJR on Sun 25 Sep 2011 at 04:52 AM
Nobody is forcing anyone to work at Amazon. If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.
If what the commenter says is true - that this Amazon workplace was voted the best place to work by readers - then this story is nothing but another commie/liberal anti-corporate hit piece.
Now we have air conditioning entitlement.. What's next?
#7 Posted by padikiller, CJR on Sun 25 Sep 2011 at 07:56 AM
There is another Seattle-based company with a large system of warehouses that treats its employees well and that is Costco, they don't exploit the temp workers and you have never seen them in the news for employee abuse. Additionally, they don't hold state legislators hostage for sales tax breaks either.
Costco continually turns a profit and Amazon has yet to turn a profit, so those who are claiming it is some kind of liberal, commie based complaint to report Amazon's misdeeds are way off base.
Furthermore, who do you think wound up paying for the injured workers if workers comp didn't and they were uninsured? Us, the taxpayer.
#8 Posted by On the other hand, CJR on Sun 25 Sep 2011 at 02:31 PM
Here's the copy of the letter amazon sent OSHA.
http://www.mcall.com/news/local/mc-amazon-document-3,0,3783986.htmlpage
They were installing air conditioners and they put EMT's onsite after the complaint.
The claims are documented and temp agency abuse is kind of rampant. In my opinion, companies shouldn't be allowed to churn employees from temp agencies when the duties are permanent.
Man it must suck to live in Allentown when onsite emt's are required at the "Reader's Choice Best Workplace" (Link please Leighmom2)
#9 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Sun 25 Sep 2011 at 04:10 PM
Now have you commie/liberals thought through this air conditioning entitlement thoroughly?
You know that the steel, aluminum and copper in air conditioning units come from strip mines, right?
And the refrigerants deplete the ozone.
And the coal plants that produce the electricity to cool these huge warehouses will dump tons upon tons of CO2 into the atmosphere...
And the evaporators breed Legionaire's disease.
Are you willing to let the few remaining polar bears drown in the meltwater of corporate greed just so the fat cats at Amazon can CYA with OSHA?
#10 Posted by padikiller, CJR on Sun 25 Sep 2011 at 06:31 PM
Did the government force Amazon to build a hotbox warehouse in an area for heat waves? No, and I imagine they can move their warehouses anytime they'd like from the recent events in Texas. They could move to a cooler clime. If they aren't going to move then they should adhere to minimum standards for workplace safety. It's not hard. Nobody is even telling them to stop using contract labor for permanent work and to pay benefits. All they're asking for are conditions on the job that don't require emt's and ambulances outside.
Too much to ask?
#11 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Sun 25 Sep 2011 at 09:27 PM
Yes, damn it, it is too much to ask!...
You are not entitled to air conditioning!.
If you demand air conditioning and your employer doesn't have it... Go somewhere else. Otherwise, suck it up and deal with it, as human beings have done throughout history.
What's next? Air conditioning in coal mines? For road crews?
Where in the OSHA regs does it say that employer has to provide air conditioning? (Though you commies will have it in there soon, if you have it your way)
#12 Posted by padikiller, CJR on Sun 25 Sep 2011 at 09:45 PM
And another damned thing...
When you go to a football game.. What the hell do you see? Ambulances standing by.
When you go to an airport, what do you see? Ambulances standing by.
People choose to take risks... Just like people choose to work at Amazon by the thousands.
Do crossing guards get air conditioning? Or tree limbers? Or cops? Or anyone who works outside?
This country has become laden with a debt-ridden commie underclass that expects everything to be handed to it.
Now we have a "right" to fricking air conditioning!... Unbelievable!...
#13 Posted by padikiller, CJR on Sun 25 Sep 2011 at 10:29 PM
There's a shocking amount of willful ignorance in the comments.
If the conditions in the warehouse are so bad that the LOCAL HOSPITAL is notifying OSHA because so many workers have suffered to the point of NEEDING HOSPITALIZATION--damn straight those cheapskates need to install AC. These people aren't getting sweaty and uncomfortable; they're passing out from heatstroke. If the conditions aren't changed, someone WILL eventually die as a direct result of the working conditions.
Hope the woman who was fired for having breast cancer sues them for all they're worth.
#14 Posted by A Random Reader, CJR on Fri 25 Nov 2011 at 04:38 PM