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Walk 11 miles a shift and pick up an order every 33 seconds: Revealed, how Amazon works staff ‘to the bone’

Adam Littler, 23, told of the ‘unbelievable’ pressure of working for the retailer

Amazon staff have previously claimed they are tracked around huge warehouses via GPS – but the firm denies this

Previous workers have told how even their toilet breaks were timed

Employment experts have given warnings over workers’ conditions

 

Internet giant Amazon works its warehouse staff ‘to the bone’ in long and relentless shifts, a former employee claimed yesterday.

Graduate Adam Littler, 23, said he walked up to 11 miles as he worked 10-and-a-half hour night shifts inside the online retailer’s giant distribution centre in Swansea.

He was expected to collect a customer order every 33 seconds and told BBC1’s Panorama he was subjected to ‘unbelievable’ pressure to meet efficiency targets.

Cardboard city: This Amazon distribution centre in Swansea covers 800,000 square feet. The complex is approaching its busiest time of the year

Cardboard city: This Amazon distribution centre in Swansea covers 800,000 square feet. The complex is approaching its busiest time of the year

Risks: Experts have warned that conditions inside the warehouses could increases rates of mental and physical illness among workers

Risks: Experts have warned that conditions inside the warehouses could increases rates of mental and physical illness among workers

Amazon staff have previously revealed how they have been tracked by GPS tags inside the company’s eight UK warehouses and even had toilet breaks timed – claims the firm has denied.

One employee at the warehouse – otherwise known as a ‘fulfilment centre’ – in Rugeley, Staffordshire, likened conditions to a ‘slave camp’.

The American company, which employed 15,000 in its UK warehouses in the run-up to last Christmas, is currently approaching its busiest period of the year.

Amazon has denied exploiting staff and said its productivity targets were set according to performance levels achieved by its work force.

But experts, including Professor Michael Marmot, of University College London, have questioned if conditions inside the firm’s giant warehouses could increase workers’ risk of mental or physical illness.

Targets: Adam Littler, a 23-year-old graduate, told BBC1's Panorama how he worked 10-and-a-half hour night shifts and was given an order every 33 seconds

Targets: Adam Littler, a 23-year-old graduate, told BBC1’s Panorama how he worked 10-and-a-half hour night shifts and was given an order every 33 seconds

Mr Littler wore a pedometer after he was given a job as a ‘picker’, pushing trolleys around and collecting customers’ orders from the shelves, at Amazon’s 800,000sq ft distribution centre in Swansea.

Pickers are given handheld scanners which calculate the most efficient route to collect items, and tell them if they are hitting their targets.

The documentary, due to be screened tonight, shows him racing to beat the scanner’s digital countdown to collect each item.

‘You all literally work to the bone and there doesn’t seem to be any reward or any let-up,’ he said.

‘I’ve never done a job like this before. The pressure’s unbelievable.’ Mr Littler was recruited via an agency for seven weeks’ work. He spent four weeks on the day shift, earning £6.50 an hour, before moving to night shifts on £8.25 an hour.

He claimed he worked four nights a week for 10-and-a-half hours, including a paid half-hour break and two 15-minute unpaid breaks.

Employment barrister Giles Bedloe said night shifts involving heavy physical work should be limited to eight hours in any 24-hour period.

Mr Littler’s scanner set him a target of collecting 110 items per hour, but he said he rarely hit the target. After working one night shift, he said: ‘I managed to walk or hobble nearly 11 miles. I’m absolutely shattered.’

Former workers have claimed the firm imposed a ‘three strikes and release’ discipline system to sack workers who did not meet targets.

Amazon has also come under pressure for its use of controversial ‘zero-hours’ contracts and for its tax avoidance practices.

Figures supplied to the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee showed its UK sales were £7.1billion between 2009 to 2011. But its UK company, Amazon.co.uk Ltd, paid only £2.3million in corporation tax as the majority of its sales were handled through its European subsidiary in low-tax Luxembourg.

'Unbelievable' pressure: Mr Littler was employed via an agency, and was paid £6.50 an hour to work during the day and £8.25 an hour to work at night

‘Unbelievable’ pressure: Mr Littler was employed via an agency, and was paid £6.50 an hour to work during the day and £8.25 an hour to work at night

'Fulfilment centre': Mr Little worked at this huge complex in Swansea, inside which staff are tracked by GPS devices

‘Fulfilment centre': Mr Little worked at this huge complex in Swansea, inside which staff are tracked by GPS devices

Although tax avoidance is legal, Amazon’s rivals have complained it has an unfair advantage as it can offer cheaper prices.

Amazon said an independent expert had advised them that its pickers experienced similar conditions to workers in other industries and did not face an increased risk of mental or physical illness, and that its safety and illness records were better than industry competitors.

Recruits are warned the job is physically demanding, it said, and all shift patterns meet legal requirements.

A spokesman said: ‘The safety of our associates is our number one priority and we adhere to all regulations and employment law. Independent legal and health and safety experts review our processes as a further method of ensuring compliance.’

Sourced from dailymail.co.uk
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Fox News finally went off on Walmart for their shady practices. PSYCH.

This Fox News mash-up featuring Sean Hannity sheds a not-so-flattering light on how Walmart makes its millions. And while it’s clearly pieced-together clips, it highlights a pretty glaring hypocrisy. In all of Hannity’s contempt for working people and reverence for corporate giants like Walmart, he consistently fails to mention a few simple things:

 

#1: Corporations are the country’s top welfare abusers.

And Walmart is one of the worst offenders.

#2: For all the billions of dollars companies like Walmart take from U.S. taxpayers, there’s a huge trade-off.

And too often, it’s the country’s youth who stand to lose the most.

Take a look at the Fox News clip mash-up below, created by Walmart 1 Percent, and then ask yourself: Who are the real leeches on our economy?

 

Sourced from upworthy.com

 

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US Malls prep for attacks after jihadi call to arms

Managers of giant shopping malls from New Jersey to San Diego are on alert for terrorist threats and say they are coordinating with law enforcement after release of a Somali extremist group video encouraging deadly attacks.

Westfield Corp., manager of 38 flagship malls across the United States and more internationally, said Monday that it sees “no evidence of an imminent threat” to its centers but “will take every available step to keep our shopping centers safe.”

While declining to discuss specific security measures, the company said its top security executives are coordinating with local police and government agencies.

It said its malls — which include the giant Garden State Plaza outside New York City, Montgomery Mall outside Washington, D.C., Horton Plaza in San Diego, Century City in Los Angeles and the Westfield San Francisco Centre​ near Union Square — are operating as normal despite “significant resources” devoted to security.

The video threatening a terror attack was released by al-Shabaab, a southern Somalia-based group that took responsibility for an attack in 2013 at the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi, Kenya, that left more than 60 people dead.

“If just a handful of mujahedin fighters could bring Kenya to a complete standstill for nearly a week, imagine what a dedicated mujahedin in the West could do to the American or Jewish-owned shopping centers across the world,” an unidentified man says on the video. “What if such an attack was to occur in the Mall of America in Minnesota?”

The International Council of Shopping Centers, a New York-based trade association, said many other smaller centers and malls across the country are updating security planning with local authorities.

“The shopping center industry will continue to work with its law enforcement partners to ensure that shopping centers are safe and comfortable environments in which to shop,” the council said. “Consumers can be assured that their safety and the safety of shopping center employees are the industry’s number one priority.”

The Mall of America, the large center at Bloomington, Minn., took immediate steps. Bloomington police released a statement on behalf of the mall law-enforcement agencies saying it sees “no credible threat” to the mall as a result of the video. It said the mall has “implemented extra security precautions.”

Jesse Tron, spokesman for the International Council of Shopping Centers, said mall security has been constantly upgraded since the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks, but that there was no “one size fits all” security plan for shopping centers.

“There won’t be any mad dash or scramble to improve security because security is constantly evolving and improving,” Trontold USA TODAY. “Security officials are not reactionary because they have been doing this all along.”

That doesn’t mean there won’t be additional security measures. The Mall of America issued a statement saying it had “implemented extra security precautions.”

But mall safety continues to mean uniformed and non-uniformed officers, video cameras and other measures seen and unseen, Tron said. It also means an online terrorism awareness program that teaches officers what to watch for, what to report and how to stay alert to threats 24/7.

Communication is the key, Tron said. Security works closely with local law enforcement. Any SWAT team sent to a mall likely has been there before in training. Plans are in place. And when a threat surfaces, information is shared with police and other officials.

“It’s not just mall security staff, it’s local PD, the FBI — they are all working on these things every day,” said Jim Fernandez, who overseas the online Shopping Center Security Terrorism Awareness Training Program and other terrorism awareness programs at LSU’s Stephenson National Center for Security Research and Training.

Fernandez said a couple thousand security officers take the center’s online training program every year.

“It can look at everything from taking notice if someone wears a long winter coat into the mall on a hot summer day to handling an active shooter situation,” Fernandez said.

The Mall of America, among the largest shopping malls in the world, employs more than 12,000 people at more than 500 stores and 50 restaurants. It is the world’s busiest mall, bringing in more than 40 million visitors annually.

Mall officials issued a statement saying they take any potential threat seriously. It added that some precautions will be noticeable, others won’t.

Bloomington Police said there is no credible threat associated with the video. The police statement jointly issued with the FBI, the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Department, Metro Transit Police and Mall of America Security, called the Mall of America a “very safe place.”

Still, the secretary of Homeland Security warned shoppers at malls across the nation to be vigilant in the wake of new terrorist threats.

“I’m not telling people to not go to the mall,” Secretary Jeh Johnson said Sunday on NBC’s Meet the Press. “I think that there needs to be an awareness.”

The FBI and Department of Homeland Security issued a statement Sunday saying they have been working closely with state and local authorities in recent months to “prevent and mitigate these types of threats.”

“We are in constant communication with federal officials,” Tron said. “Safety is always the number one priority.”

 

Sourced from USAtoday.com

 

 

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