Amazon settles and will pay delivery drivers $62M in taken tips
| It’s a tiny, tiny drop in Amazon’s $386 billion-dollar bucket, but the giant is going to be paying a $61.7 million mea culpa in tips promised but not paid to some delivery drivers during an almost three-year period. As The Washington Post (which is owned by Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos) reported, the e-commerce behemoth settled with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) over compensation for contract drivers who drop off PrimeNow and AmazonFresh (your groceries!) packages. The agency said the drivers were supposed to get all tips paid in the app, but that Amazon lowered hourly wages and snagged tips to make up the difference. Long story short: Affected drivers will get that money back. Apparently, some Amazon employees fretted that news of the tip-taking could set off a “reputation tinderbox.” It certainly comes at an interesting time, as Amazon workers in Alabama are set to vote on unionizing one of its warehouses for the first time in the United States, amid reports of an “aggressive anti-union drive” from the company. |
