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Apple store workers should be paid for time waiting to be searched, court rules

latimes.com

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Re: Apple store workers should be paid for time waiting to be searched, court rules

#21

Post by matz1 »

olliej wrote: post #4

Omg, I still can't believe that was in any doubt. If you are required to be at work, then you should be paid for that time. Just because you aren't "working" does change that the business is requiring you to be there. If nothing else this should push them to make leaving work not take 20- 45 minutes. WTF. How does anyone think it's acceptable to [funcitonally] detain people.

>How does anyone think it's acceptable to [funcitonally] detain people

From the business perspective, provided they can get a way with it, it is just another business decision, namely reducing cost and increasing profit. I would do the same.

Re: Apple store workers should be paid for time waiting to be searched, court rules

#22

Post by JohnFen »

michaelhoffman wrote: post #16
olliej wrote: post #4

Omg, I still can't believe that was in any doubt. If you are required to be at work, then you should be paid for that time. Just because you aren't "working" does change that the business is requiring you to be there. If nothing else this should push them to make leaving work not take 20- 45 minutes. WTF. How does anyone think it's acceptable to [funcitonally] detain people.

Apple argues that it's not required because you aren't required to be searched, it's only if an employee freely chooses to use the ~~~privilege~~~ of taking your personal items to work that they are searched. You can always come to work with nothing and not be searched. I think this argument is BS and it looks like so did the California Supreme Court. Apple argues that this choice is of benefit only to the employees…

As you say, Apple's argument is ludicrous on its face (as the court pointed out) because Apple also requires employees to wear special clothing at work, and are forbidden from wearing that clothing off-premises. So employees must carry that clothing to work with them. I suppose that doesn't mean that they have to put it in a container, but that's a real stretch of an argument that the court also rejected.

Re: Apple store workers should be paid for time waiting to be searched, court rules

#23

Post by ipqk »

whalesalad wrote: post #6

Seriously?!? When I worked at Apple Retail it took all of 10 seconds for the security search. This was at one of the busiest stores in the nation and during the booming period of the iPhone 3/4. EDIT: Y'all are completely smokin me with these downvotes. I am not against this decision, I am just surprised that the issue grew to be this severe.

Yeah, it's not like Apple stores have changed or become busier in the past 9 years.

Re: Apple store workers should be paid for time waiting to be searched, court rules

#24

Post by phibz »

olliej wrote: post #4

Omg, I still can't believe that was in any doubt. If you are required to be at work, then you should be paid for that time. Just because you aren't "working" does change that the business is requiring you to be there. If nothing else this should push them to make leaving work not take 20- 45 minutes. WTF. How does anyone think it's acceptable to [funcitonally] detain people.

Clearly someone thought it was unfair enough to take Apple to court over it.

Workers rights has always been a struggle but this sort of behavior has been trending up over the last 20 years. From the "permatemp" jobs to the new no benefits "gig economy" it's worrying.

I'm and experienced software developer and even I have seen this sort of thing.

I worked for a company out of San Jose. I was hired full-time with benefits and a bonus structure based on performance. But I had to switch to hourly at no pay if I was "on the bench" between projects. Despite a year of solid work, and receiving my performance bonus, true to the agreement when I rolled off a project they stopped paying me. I went 4 months without pay. And when they finally found a new project for me to join I had to take a significant pay cut because the rate for the new client was less.

Passing on risk and consequence to the employee seems to be increasingly common.

Re: Apple store workers should be paid for time waiting to be searched, court rules

#25

Post by JohnFen »

modoc wrote: post #20
olliej wrote: post #4

Omg, I still can't believe that was in any doubt. If you are required to be at work, then you should be paid for that time. Just because you aren't "working" does change that the business is requiring you to be there. If nothing else this should push them to make leaving work not take 20- 45 minutes. WTF. How does anyone think it's acceptable to [funcitonally] detain people.

not saying its okay, but this has been standard practice at every retail store job I ever worked (mostly 20+ years ago). You clocked out in the back, and then had to wait to be searched and released in the front of the store. This isn't Apple being weird, this is amazingly common.

It may be common, but it's obviously wrong. It's good that Apple got slapped for this. It would be even better if all other companies that do this got slapped too.

Re: Apple store workers should be paid for time waiting to be searched, court rules

#26

Post by danso »

jrockway wrote: post #15

> Employees are supposed to find a manager or security officer to do the searches after they clock out. Employees estimate that waiting for and undergoing the searches can take five to 20 minutes, or, on busiest days, up to 45 minutes. This also seems to be their process for picking up orders at the store. It's pure chaos, and I find it at least somewhat amusing that at least Apple treats their employees and customer…

Really? (this is more of a genuine huh than a rhetorical huh) I guess I have relatively low expectations as a customer, but my most recent experience was picking up a laptop fixed up by AppleCare and I had to wait about 5 minutes for people ahead of me, but an employee found a place for me to sit and wait, and directed the relevant laptop-service employee to me when he was available.

It seemed like a reasonable in-store delay even though Apple was fully obligated to service my laptop under warranty (and had to ship it out for a few days to do so).

Re: Apple store workers should be paid for time waiting to be searched, court rules

#27

Post by Ididntdothis »

modoc wrote: post #20
olliej wrote: post #4

Omg, I still can't believe that was in any doubt. If you are required to be at work, then you should be paid for that time. Just because you aren't "working" does change that the business is requiring you to be there. If nothing else this should push them to make leaving work not take 20- 45 minutes. WTF. How does anyone think it's acceptable to [funcitonally] detain people.

not saying its okay, but this has been standard practice at every retail store job I ever worked (mostly 20+ years ago). You clocked out in the back, and then had to wait to be searched and released in the front of the store. This isn't Apple being weird, this is amazingly common.

As long as you are required to be at work and can’t leave you should get paid. With increasing surveillance some smartasses will soon have the idea that employees shouldn’t get paid during downtime when they are waiting for customers.

Re: Apple store workers should be paid for time waiting to be searched, court rules

#28

Post by kelnos »

egypturnash wrote: post #11
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #7

Note this is in California. At the US, level, 5 years ago, the Supreme Court ruled that Amazon did not have to pay its workers for the time spent waiting for screening. Excerpt from the NY Times article about that decision: WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled unanimously that a temp agency was not required to pay workers at Amazon warehouses for the time they spent waiting to go through a security screeni…

ugh, one more reason to add to the pile of reasons to not give my money to Amazon.

Or Apple, I guess? It's not like Apple is any better; they're only now going to do the right thing because a judge is telling them to do so.

Re: Apple store workers should be paid for time waiting to be searched, court rules

#29

Post by sterlind »

megous wrote: post #12

"A federal district court judge ruled in favor of Apple, deciding that workers had to prove they not only were restrained from leaving but that there was no way to avoid having personal items searched." So workers that would not have a personal bag would avoid a search? You can take away stuff from the store by hiding it in your clothes, I guess unless you're working naked. How would anyone be able to avoid the searc…

I think Apple was only searching bags, not patting down their employees (likely out of fear of sexual harassment allegations than any principled restraint on Apple's part.)

Re: Apple store workers should be paid for time waiting to be searched, court rules

#30

Post by danso »

whalesalad wrote: post #6

Seriously?!? When I worked at Apple Retail it took all of 10 seconds for the security search. This was at one of the busiest stores in the nation and during the booming period of the iPhone 3/4. EDIT: Y'all are completely smokin me with these downvotes. I am not against this decision, I am just surprised that the issue grew to be this severe.

I'd wager to bet that Apple's inventory is much more diverse and smaller (in physical size) compared to the iphone 3 days. I don't remember Apple having as many SKUs as they do now that are expensive and highly-wanted and very small, e.g. Apple Watch and Airpods.
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