Amazon employees left unable to work by accidents on the job have resorted to on-line fundraising campaigns to pay their payments as they battle for compensation and incapacity advantages.
Three present staff, injured whereas working within the expertise big’s warehouses, described a “bureaucratic, terrible process” whereas they sought monetary help. One was rendered homeless.
Throughout interviews with the Guardian, they alleged the corporate ignored employees’ issues over the strains of warehouse work, denied requests for compensation or advantages after accidents, and put productiveness above all else.
In response, Amazon acknowledged it had discovered a “few” issues, however claimed the employees had supplied “a lot of inaccurate information”. The corporate didn’t specify which components of the accounts it deemed inaccurate.
Amazon – one of many world’s largest employers, with 1.5 million workers internationally – has lengthy confronted criticism over the working and security situations inside its warehouses. It has repeatedly pushed again, claiming that the corporate was “working toward being best in class” on security as a part of its declared intent to create “Earth’s safest place to work”.
Through the years, nevertheless, quite a few employees have come ahead with troubling tales of accidents incurred on the job; being despatched again to work by Amazon’s on-site medical care unit, Amcare; and lengthy fights and delays in making an attempt to acquire employees compensation, medical care, lodging and incapacity advantages within the months and years that adopted.
‘This is why we’re homeless’
In August 2023, Keith Williams was loading containers by himself off a trailer on the delivery dock at Amazon’s SWF1 warehouse in Rock Tavern, New York. A pc desk fell onto him, hitting the again of his head.
Feeling nauseous and dizzy after being struck, Williams went to Amcare, the place he was given aspirin and ice. He went to pressing care, as a result of he mentioned they didn’t know what to do for him at Amcare.
Returning to work the following day, Williams mentioned he was positioned on mild obligation, however stored getting bothered by managers asking what he was doing sitting round regardless of lodging because of his harm. “They just sit you there in uncomfortable places, and you’re on display like a human zoo in the middle of the warehouse,” he recalled.
“That’s all they’re concerned about: how much you can make them, how much they can push out of you, how little they can give you, and how much they can get out of you.”
Simply 5 months later, in February, Williams was injured on the job once more after being tasked with repeatedly lifting heavy packages, with out being rotated to much less intense departments. When he tried to elevate a package deal, abruptly he felt a shot of ache in his wrist and elbow, and couldn’t decide it up.
He went to Amcare, earlier than heading to pressing care on his personal accord after ready for an hour at Amcare.
Out of labor and injured, Williams has but to obtain incapacity advantages. “I’m battling with the workers compensation insurer, they give me the runaround a lot,” he mentioned. “Because I hadn’t been there a full year when I got hurt in February, I wasn’t able to receive my full benefits, which is why we’re homeless – because we can’t afford housing.”
In April, Williams and his household have been evicted from their dwelling after a dispute with a landlord. Unable to lift the funds for a brand new rental, they have been pressured to maneuver right into a motel.
As Williams recovers from his repetitive movement harm, a GoFundMe marketing campaign was began on his household’s behalf whereas they grappled with the the monetary impression of his office harm.
“I have no grip strength,” he mentioned. “I can’t carry things very long. Even a gallon of milk is tiring … My day to day life has been hit so hard, everything has an added measure of difficulty now.
“There’s just no thought, or no care to, what kind of strain gets put on the body, even though we would constantly say something about it.”
‘I’ve been by way of my financial savings, 401k and bank cards’
Two years after she started working as a picker and stower at Amazon’s STL8 warehouse exterior of St Louis, Missouri, in August 2021, Christine Manno started experiencing extreme carpal tunnel signs as a result of repetitive motions inherent together with her job. She had two surgical procedures, within the following October and December, and returned to full obligation just a few days after her second surgical procedure.
“Over the course of a 12-hour shift, I do three 12-hour shifts,” Manno mentioned. “I could lift thousands of pounds over the course of the shift, and my hands were still visibly swollen, so my hands started to get worse.”
In Could 2022, when reaching for a excessive field, she felt pains down her again, each arms, and down into her legs.
After her preliminary declare for incapacity advantages confronted resistance, Manno retained an lawyer. Finally, her case was authorised.
In January 2023, eight months after the harm, she went to see a spinal surgeon. “He agreed that it was during the course of my job that these injuries occurred,” Manno mentioned. “Up to that point, I had had no type of treatment. They wouldn’t allow anything.”
By the course of working whereas injured, Manno was capable of work with restrictions. She started bodily remedy, however mentioned it didn’t assist alleviate her ache.
Throughout this time, whereas driving a turret truck within the Amazon warehouse, which doesn’t require lifting, Manno bought dizzy and lightheaded, sostopped and knowledgeable her supervisor. She says she was informed to take a seat down, however ordered 20 minutes later to return to the truck and end the job.
Amazon knowledgeable her in July 2023 they might now not accommodate her restrictions, she says, regardless of a physician recommending everlasting restrictions. The physician’s request for a referral to a ache administration specialist, in keeping with Manno, however Amazon denied that additionally.
Along with her short-term incapacity advantages exhausted, extra not too long ago she has struggled to steer the agency to grant her long-term advantages.
After her medical points and lack of ability to work left her in monetary straits, she began a GoFundMe whereas ready on a call concerning the advantages.
“They keep telling me they need more documentation, yet workers compensation won’t let me see a doctor to get more documentation, but I can’t get treatment because when they know it’s a work injury, they won’t authorize treatment through health insurance,” mentioned Manno. “I’ve been through my savings, 401k and credit cards.
“I have multiple bill collectors calling 20, 30 times a day. It’s been hell, and all the stress directly affects my neck injury and I have severe sciatica and very limited use of my hands, I lose feeling and end up dropping things. My hands don’t function like they should.”
‘Safety is an afterthought’
Again at SWF1 in Rock Tavern, final August stower Nik Moran smashed his finger. He drove himself to the emergency room, the place he bought stitches for the harm.
“I went back to work right away,” as a result of Amazon’s employee compensation unit “doesn’t pay you for the first week”, he mentioned. “It’s just a bureaucratic, terrible process.”
Shortly after the harm, he obtained a employees’ compensation lawyer as a result of he was conscious of the problems coworkers have skilled in making an attempt to get medical care coated and compensation for accidents on the job, and he famous Amazon has disputed protecting his medical take care of the harm.
“Amazon talks a big game about safety, but their main priority is productivity,” claimed Moran. “Safety is an afterthought.”
Contacted by the Guardian in regards to the three employees’ accounts, Maureen Lynch Vogel, an Amazon spokesperson, mentioned: “Our employees’ safety and health is our top priority. While we usually don’t comment on employees’ individual circumstances, these individuals have unfortunately chosen to share a lot of inaccurate information.
“Each of these claims have been thoroughly investigated, and – in the few cases where we found issues – our team has worked to address their concerns and accommodate their needs as appropriate.”
Amazon didn’t reply to a request for clarification on which info it deemed inaccurate, and what points have been discovered and resolved.
‘Earth’s most secure place to work’
Amazon, which pledged three years in the past to turn into “Earth’s safest place to work”, additionally mentioned it was taking steps to chop its office harm price in half by 2025. However labor advocacy and employee security teams declare its harm charges stay dangerously excessive.
The Strategic Organizing Heart, a coalition of commerce unions, has yearly launched reviews on Amazon’s harm charges for the previous 4 years. Its newest report discovered Amazon’s harm price for 2023 was 6.5 accidents per 100 employees. In 2020, the yr earlier than the corporate first introduced plans to halve its harm price, the SOC says it stood at 6.6 per 100 employees.
Amazon’s harm charges stay stay “very high”, argued David Rosenblatt, deputy director of strategic analysis and campaigns on the Strategic Organizing Heart. “They have gone down barely at all, a couple percent over the last year.”
In a separate report, printed final month, the Nationwide Employment Legislation Challenge claimed that Amazon’s harm price for warehousing services was “more than 1.5 times” that of TJX Corporations, the proprietor of TJ Maxx and TK Maxx, and virtually triple that of Walmart.
Amazon denied the allegations within the reviews. “These papers are full of misleading and false information, and are created by groups who refuse to accept that we’ve made real progress because doing so would undercut their agenda,” mentioned Vogel, the spokesperson, who claimed its general harm price within the US had declined by 28%.
Williams, the SWF1 employee in New York, not too long ago had some excellent news. After his on-line marketing campaign raised 1000’s of {dollars}, his household had a rental utility accepted. They hope to maneuver into a brand new house subsequent month.
“There were a lot of tears,” he informed the Guardian. “It was a little bit of sunshine in a dark time.”
He’s nonetheless combating for incapacity advantages from Amazon. “The gap between how much this company makes, and how much it gives its workers, is way too, too high,” mentioned Williams.
