Live data from Hacker News

Amazon delivery drivers complain about bad work conditions

dailymail.co.uk

41–50 of 109 posts

Re: Amazon delivery drivers complain about bad work conditions

#41
post #17

Meanwhile, Jeff Bezos is worth 100 billion dollars... gotta love wild capitalism! (not a communist, before somebody gets offended)... wow, the downvotes without any reasoning or debate... go world go!

You might enjoy this, I know I agree with it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNfAAQUQ_54&t=42m43s

(turn the sound down some before clicking the link though, it features screaming about important things for the right reasons)

Re: Amazon delivery drivers complain about bad work conditions

#42
I always wondered why not have all delivery done at night? There is a lot less traffic generally between 10PM and 6AM for example, it seems like they could do a lot more deliveries and it would put less load on the highways and be safer and less stressful for drivers. And not sitting in traffic jams means less fuel consumption. Is there some reason why that is not done?

Re: Amazon delivery drivers complain about bad work conditions

#43

I always wondered why not have all delivery done at night? There is a lot less traffic generally between 10PM and 6AM for example, it seems like they could do a lot more deliveries and it would put less load on the highways and be safer and less stressful for drivers. And not sitting in traffic jams means less fuel consumption. Is there some reason why that is not done?

Good luck finding any houses at night or being shot while trying to use flashlight

Re: Amazon delivery drivers complain about bad work conditions

#44
post #24

On reddit, "spagheddie" wrote: I was once a FedEx delivery driver, so I don't know how it is for Amazon, but I would imagine it's similar? At FedEx we got paid per package delivered, which means the faster you deliver your packages, the more you are technically getting paid per hour. In addition to this, you'd get a daily bonus for delivering the packages fast. We could take our lunches whenever, nobody cared as long…

I've noticed this sort of thing a lot in the job market: performance or pay are directly tied to metrics resulting in employees being incentivized into odd behaviors (breaking the law, sabotaging coworkers, skipping breaks/lunch, stagtegically cancelling or avoiding work, etc). This type of management through metrics goes hand in hand with the gig economy and also temp agency/contract work.

And the people making those incentives know it! They can't always legally tell an employee to do bad/illegal things, but they sure know how to build a system where thats the only option.

Re: Amazon delivery drivers complain about bad work conditions

#45

There was a time when you could give a christmas bonus to the mail man. I wish that the delivery men were more consistent, I would love to be able to give them a cash gift for all the work they do for me and my family on a regular basis. Unfortunately it seems like during the holidays the usual delivery guy isn't around and it's a chaotic mix of people. While we are here, I hate that they are now making people delive…

USPS now delivers exclusively on Sunday for Amazon. It looks like they are expanding this service with lower wage jobs, with less benefits compared to the traditional postal worker. I was shocked to receive a package from Amazon via USPS this past Labor day, of all days. Quite depressing to see the continued erosion of rights workers fought for over the past century, to service one of the most powerful companies in t…

You are misguided, working on Sunday is orthogonal to treating workers well. I admire your concern, but other metrics shine much more light on concern for humanity.

Growing up in Las Vegas, working on weekends was I think, beyond even what you’d imagine in some tourist destinations, some of those are at least were seasonal. Imagine if your delivery person who you are concerned about, worked weeekends and also in the middle of the night on a swing shift, my parents did.

Were all the casinos great places to work because of all this? Absolutely not, some made Amazon look great. However, I observed:

- There were big differences in treatment of employees between different operators. The overall effort and concern they had, or did not have, overshadows any single issue. So it’s good to call out businesses, but to encourage the right behavior a broader set of metrics is better.

- Families can be healthy and thrive with weekend and shift work if it’s done right, without crushing overtime or 12 hour days, and if they are treated well overall. Things in life just happen at different times come to seem quite normal.

Re: Amazon delivery drivers complain about bad work conditions

#46
post #7

It's such a complex situation. Amazon has contracts with small companies who provide trucks and humans. Amazon provides the work, the groups of packages, the routes, the app the drivers need to use to deliver. The companies compete with each other for more 'routes' each day. They offer to take on more work, to do more. And then they hire anyone they can to fulfill those routes. The drivers themselves are on contracts…

Primarily Amazon, for not caring about the contractors life, as long packages get delivered and its cheap.

A company has a moral responsability to ensure its suppliers do meet certain standards.

Re: Amazon delivery drivers complain about bad work conditions

#47
post #43

I always wondered why not have all delivery done at night? There is a lot less traffic generally between 10PM and 6AM for example, it seems like they could do a lot more deliveries and it would put less load on the highways and be safer and less stressful for drivers. And not sitting in traffic jams means less fuel consumption. Is there some reason why that is not done?

Good luck finding any houses at night or being shot while trying to use flashlight

pretty much. A couple weeks ago there was a post to the facebook group for my village 'watch out there's a man with a white van shining a torch into people's houses'

To be followed by comments saying 'that's just the Hermes delivery guy'

Re: Amazon delivery drivers complain about bad work conditions

#48

I always wondered why not have all delivery done at night? There is a lot less traffic generally between 10PM and 6AM for example, it seems like they could do a lot more deliveries and it would put less load on the highways and be safer and less stressful for drivers. And not sitting in traffic jams means less fuel consumption. Is there some reason why that is not done?

I don't want to live in a neighbourhood where night time deliveries are the norm. You may also find that not many people want to work overnight for a basic wage either.

Re: Amazon delivery drivers complain about bad work conditions

#49
post #7

It's such a complex situation. Amazon has contracts with small companies who provide trucks and humans. Amazon provides the work, the groups of packages, the routes, the app the drivers need to use to deliver. The companies compete with each other for more 'routes' each day. They offer to take on more work, to do more. And then they hire anyone they can to fulfill those routes. The drivers themselves are on contracts…

'Who is to blame? Amazon? The companies? The drivers? Capitalism gone mad? Take your pick.'

You can add 'customers' to this list since this is where it all begins.

It isn't so long ago that all people complained about was the time it took for stuff to be delivered and all those 'we called but there was no one in' cards.

So capitalism responded and now folks have something else to complain about.

Re: Amazon delivery drivers complain about bad work conditions

#50
post #16
post #7

It's such a complex situation. Amazon has contracts with small companies who provide trucks and humans. Amazon provides the work, the groups of packages, the routes, the app the drivers need to use to deliver. The companies compete with each other for more 'routes' each day. They offer to take on more work, to do more. And then they hire anyone they can to fulfill those routes. The drivers themselves are on contracts…

Amazon. They switched from using respectable national couriers that employ people full time in well paid jobs, to creating a platform that rewards bottom feeders. Adsense/Adwords did it with the ad industry. Uber did it with taxis etc. The constant march of technology for efficiency without considering the ethics.

'They switched from using respectable national couriers that employ people full time in well paid jobs, to creating a platform that rewards bottom feeders.'

Speaking about the UK, so apologies if the situation was different elsewhere.

But...

From how I remember it, these 'respectable national couriers' were just not doing the job they were paid to do.

Post reply on HN