Amazon ‘Anti-Union Propaganda,’ Employees Monitoring Craf

Italo Medelius-Marsno was a law student at North Carolina Central University in 2022, when he took a job Heroic Warehouses near Rale city to earn some additional cash.

Last month, the company is contrary to someone else during its three -year tenure. Now, when he shows his shift to the shipping dock, Medelius-Marsno says that he has met with flyers and mounted TVs, who urge him to “vote”, as well as at the workstation There are also QR codes that move forward. An opposing union websiteDuring the meetings, managers discourage federation.

The facility in North Carolina’s suburb of Garner, employs about 4,700 workers and is the latest labor performance site of Amazon. Labor on site Voting this week Carolina Amazonian for solidarity and empowerment (cause) to join Amazonian United, a ground -level union made of current and former employees.

Causes started the group in 2022 in an attempt to promote wages and improve the condition of working. Voting on the site, known as RDU1, wraps on Saturday.

Workers of RDU1 and other facilities told CNBC that Amazon is using digital tools to prevent employees from federation. This includes messaging through the company’s app and workstation computer. There are also automated software and handheld package scanners Inside the warehouse, the employee’s performance is used to track, so the company knows when the employees are working or doing something else.

Amazon said that it does not require employees to meet specific productivity speed or goals.

Medellius-Marsno said, “You cannot move away from Union-Anti-PropeGanda or are being surveyed, because when you walk, they have cameras in the entire building,” Medalyse-Marsno said , Which is an organizer with the reason. “You cannot go into work without scanning the badge or logging into the machine. Similarly they track you.”

Reason representatives have also made their pitch to RDU1 employees. The Sangh has installed a “causal headquarters” tent across the road from the warehouse and removed the lephalets in the brake room of the convenience.

Amazon, the second largest private employer of the nation, has long demanded to keep unions out of its rank. Strategy was successful in America By 2022When the workers voted to join the Amazon Labor Union at a States island warehouse. Last month, workers at a complete food item shop in Philadelphia Voted to join United Food and Commercial Workers Union.

In December, Amazon delivery and warehouse workers went to nine facilities strikeConducted by Teamstors, during the height of the holiday shopping to push the company on the bargaining table. The strike ended on the eve of Christmas. Amazon said that it had no effect on the operating company.

Union elections at the other Amazon Warehouse in New York have ended in defeat in recent years, while an union drive results in an Alabama facility are being combated. The organizers have indicated Constant monitoring of Amazon of employees as a catalyst and a preventive of union campaigns.

A spokesperson said that NLRB had alleged 343 open or inappropriate labor exercises filed against Amazon with the agency, its subsidiary companies and delivery companies in the US.

Amazon has argued in the legal filing that NLRB, which issues complaints against the companies or unions to violate the labor law, is unconstitutional. Spacex of Elon Musk, Starbucks And Trader Joe has also made similar claims that challenge the authority of the agency.

Amazon spokesman Eleen Hards said that the employees of the company can choose whether to join a union or not. He said that Amazon provides wages and benefits that unions usually want.

Hards said in a statement, “We believe that both decisions should be protected equally, which is why we talk openly, openly and respectfully about these subjects, actively with employees Share so that they can use that information to make an informed decision. “

The Hards said that the company does not retaliate against the employees for the activities of the Sangh, and claims that its employee’s monitoring discourage them with “odd”. He also disputed the claim of Medalyus-Marsno that the company scan and track their badges.

Hards said in a statement, “The site is operating, so employees still expect their normal work.” “In addition, the camera technology in our facilities is not to survey the employees – it is to direct the flow of goods through features and to help ensure safety and safety of both employees and inventory.”

Oin Starran, one of the reasons to be fired by Amazon earlier last year to violate the company’s drug and liquor policy, which was tracked by Amazon’s employee “Elgorithm Management of Labor”. Starran is a professor of an anthropology at Duke University, who began to work undercover in RDU1 in 2023, to do research for a book on Amazon.

“Where you came to a supervisor 100 years ago in a factory, you came to tell you if you are slipping, now in a modern warehouse like Amazon, you have been digitally tracked through a scanner. , “Starran said.

Other academics are equally paying attention to this issue. One in Research paper Published last week, Northwestern University PhD candidate Teake Vigin discovered the use of algorithms and digital devices in the company’s BHM1 warehouse in Besmer, Alabama.

Vigin said in an interview, “The black box and lack of accountability that comes with algorithm management makes it difficult for a worker or worker to decide if they are retaliating against it.” “Maybe their schedule changes slightly, work seems harder than working, the employer can say that it has nothing to do with us, it is just algorithm. But we do not know what algorithm Has changed. “

Some Amazon employees see the situation differently. Storm Smith RDU1 serves as a process assistant, including activists to monitor productivity and safety. Amazon referred to Smith to CNBC during reporting this story.

Amazon’s workplace control, such as rates and time work, “part of the job,” Smith said. He said that the employees are “always welcome” to ask what their rate is.

“For my people, if I see that your rate is not where it is believed, then I will come to you and say, ‘Hey, this is your rate, is you feeling right? Is it something like that? Which I can get to you. Like a snack, whatever you have, “Smith said.

Wigin interviewed 42 BHM1 employees after the first election in 2021, and reviewed the NLRB record of the hearing. This facility appointed more than 5,800 workers at the time of union drive.

NLRB in last November Order for third union vote After being held in BHM1, Amazon improperly intervened in two previous elections. The company has denied wrongdoing.

Amazon’s employees told Wigin that during the union campaign, the company twist the expectations of some performance to “improve the work situation” and prevent them from condensing. An employee said that these changes were partially as to why they voted against the Sangh, according to the study.

Workers filed an Amazon warehouse outside Missouri, Missouri One NLRB Complaint In May. Employees accused Amazon of using “infiltration algorithms”, when they are working to discourage them from arranging them, track, Parent told,

The employees withdrew their complaint on Tuesday. Hard disputed workers’ claims.

The MPs have reduced zero on how the monitoring could affect the organizing efforts in recent years. In 2022, former NLRB general lawyer A memorandum released Calling the group to address the corporate use of “universal monitoring and other algorithm-management equipment” to disrupt organizing efforts. Next year, Biden administration excluded Request for information On automated worker monitoring and management, given that the system can pose a risk to employees, including “the rights to create rights or join the labor union”.

However, Trump administration is trying Defeat NLRBThe President opened fire on his first day in the office in the office. Trump has With the goal of cutting the cost of the government and reducing the rules, put a notorious rival Musk of the unions, in -charge of the so -called department of government’s efficiency.

Jennifer Bates, a major union organizer in BHM1, Amazon has learned him expelled In 2023 via Atz. She was later Restored by Amazon “After a complete review of his case,” and provided the backpe, Hardes said.

Retail, wholesale and department store union, which demanded to represent BHM1 workers, Where is The Atoz app can reach the user’s GPS, photos, cameras, microphones and wifi-connection information. The Sangh also claims that “Amazon can sell the data collected to any third party companies and that data cannot be removed.” RwDSU stated that technology increases many concerns, including it that it can “right to organize”.

Hards said RwDSU’s claims are incorrect and denied that the company sells any data related to ATOZ use. He said that Atoz users should allow the app to reach things like their GPS location.

In the Garner facility, the ATOZ app is plaster with “anti-union promotion” as the RDU1 election was declared last month, said Medellius-Marsno.

An atoz message suggested that employees’ benefits may be at risk if they vote in a union, while another described as “external party” that is “claiming to be a union.”

RDU1 site leader Christon Tetemer said in another message that “can meet in a way,” and “Once, it is very difficult to delete a union.” Smith said Amazon’s response to the union drive is “asking you to exclude the facts and do your research.”

Medellius-Marsno said that it is in an environment of intimidation in all quantities.

“There is no doubt,” Medelius-Marsno said. “If we lose, fear is going to be the reason.”

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