Amazon is reinstating a pre-pandemic coverage bringing again metallic detector screenings for its 750,000 U.S.-based hourly warehouse workers, per a brand new Bloomberg report. The retail big can even require employees to register their telephones so safety personnel know they have not stolen the units.
Amazon reportedly started telling employees in choose take a look at areas in regards to the telephone registration and metallic detector screenings on Monday. The corporate is planning to step by step roll out the anti-theft measures, beginning first with take a look at warehouses after which increasing to all of its U.S. services, per Bloomberg.
Beneath the brand new coverage, workers should stroll by way of a metallic detector to depart Amazon warehouses to make sure that they have not taken something with them. Cellphone registration entails sharing the final six digits of the telephone’s serial quantity in change for an figuring out sticker.
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“We’re at all times working to make our services extra protected and safe for our workers and for all firms of all sizes that put their belief in us to retailer their stock,” an Amazon spokesperson advised Bloomberg in an emailed assertion.
Metallic detector screenings aren’t new at Amazon warehouses — they had been the norm earlier than the pandemic. However they had been controversial, and employees filed lawsuits over the screenings in 2014, looking for greater than $100 million in again wages for time spent in line ready to be screened. They alleged that they stood in line for as much as 25 minutes at a time to conform.
Inside an Amazon success middle in Robbinsville, New Jersey. Photographer: Bing Guan/Bloomberg through Getty Photos
That very same yr, the U.S. Supreme Courtroom had the ultimate say on the matter and ruled that employees weren’t entitled to again pay for time misplaced after a shift to metallic detector screenings.
Amazon additionally stopped workers from accessing their telephones earlier than the pandemic, mandating that they go away private units in automobiles or lockers. The retail big relaxed this coverage in the course of the pandemic as employees sought to be related to real-time medical info, per Bloomberg.
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In line with Business Insider, Amazon operates 110 warehouses within the U.S. with some as massive as 1,000,000 sq. ft.
Statista estimates that Amazon is the second-largest firm on the planet after Walmart, with 1.5 million international workers as of 2023.
