I'm a supervisor at UPS, so maybe I can offer an opinion (this is a throwaway account).
I'm not sure if there is anything analogous to the US Department Of Transportation in England, but we have to abide by pretty strict rules here in the USA regarding driving hours. A UPS driver cannot work over 14 hours on a shift, must have 10 hours between shifts, and cannot exceed 60 hours in a week without (IIRC) 38 consecutive hours before the next shift. That being said, we HIGHLY AVOID working drivers over 12 hours per shift, and try to take on a lot of extra help during the holiday peak season so that the work is distributed evenly.
From what I can tell from the article, these are probably inexperienced drivers who may be on their own in regards to organizing their delivery route, sorting packages on their vehicle, and learning their route. Because UPS has a centralized management system (as apposed to FedEx, for instance, which is contract based), we monitor every driver and can send other drivers to assist anyone who begins to struggle.
Its not unheard-of for UPS drivers to pee in bottles (and less often, poop in big plastic bags that are kept handy in the package cars). Its definitely not encouraged, but it happens, especially when you're on a rural route.
UPS drivers have it pretty good because of the collective bargaining that's available through the union. We're definitely going to have some rough days ahead of us for the next few weeks, but peak season is a big deal that we prepare for months in advance.
In the UK these type of delivery drivers will be driving vans weighing under 3.5t. The restrictions on driving times only apply to vehicles above this weight.
Not to detail this too much, but can you confirm a story my boss was told last week is possible? We've had the same stuff "out for delivery" for several days to a residential address. They told my boss "well, you're near the end of the route so if the driver doesn't get to you in his 12 hours it stays on the truck overnight" ... This seems daft. And repeats for days and days. I'm trying all my January stuff with FedEx but we like UPS because of the union.
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 as the packages got delivered. However, very few people ever stopped to eat their lunch. Most people would eat and drive. If there was a bathroom on your route, that's cool, but otherwise you are peeing in a bottle because you aren't trying to waste time searching for a bathroom when you could potentially deliver 4 or 5 packages in that time. All of this holds especially true at this time of the year, when guys are getting ran 6 days a week, with 200+ packages per day, and with the sun going down an hour earlier (night time delivering slows you way the fuck down).
Well what happens when you deliver so slow that you're making less than minimum wage? I don't know about Amazon, but at FedEx if you were so slow that you made less than minimum wage with your per package deliveries, you were simply paid minimum wage for that day's work.
Anyways, there are a lot of shitty jobs to have during the Christmas season but, in my opinion, this is the worst one of them all. The pay isn't bad if you have your route down; but goddamn you can't even enjoy the damn holidays because you're always on "go" mode.
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.
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.
Am I the only one here who thinks "that might actually be fun for a little bit" --- as in, not doing it as a full-time job, but as in "playing a game" once in a while? It sounds rather competitive.
In India, this gets worse. Lot of delivery guys use 2 wheelers and can often been seen carrying a huge bag full of packages on their bikes. Moreover many buildings don't have lifts so they end up carrying this load up 2 or 3 storeys. This is extremely back breaking work and add to that the pressure to deliver packages on time and navigating crazy Indian traffic on two wheelers with such heavy loads. On the other hand I am not sure what can be done.... People are just concerned about their convenience with no regards for rights of the delivery people. And given the level of unemployment it is unlikely that there will be protests from the drivers. While Indian e-commerce booms it will be on the backs of these guys.
Sobering, and almost physically painful to read. Probably the only realistic solution is the booming economy in India. Eventually, one hopes, there will be better accommodations for everyone, and the drivers will benefit along with everyone else. I assume unionization would not work due to the huge supply of alternate employees?
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 with the small companies that can end at any time. Not making your rate? Up to the small company to decide if you have a contract tomorrow.
The contracts themselves presume the drivers will deliver a route in a specific number of hours for a fixed rate of pay. But newbies work at a much slower rate. And during the holiday season, they need a lot of extra labor- a lot of newbies.
Who is to blame? Amazon? The companies? The drivers? Capitalism gone mad? Take your pick.
>Who is to blame? Amazon? The companies? The drivers? Capitalism gone mad?
All of the above? But mostly Amazon. We need to stop letting companies get away with poor practices by blaming it on a contractor. Companies should be accountable for the behaviour of their contractors.
If Amazon wants to structure their delivery business around contractors, they have a responsibility to require the contractors provide good working conditions.
I agree, this is part of the "gig" economy gone bad. I think the solution is quite simple though. All contracts must also include a minimum wage (not saying this is the US minimum wage currently) per hour. This sets a floor and forces more of the cost back up the chain. It fixes the problem of someone forcing minimally bid contracts to people who are desperate for any kind of work. We have great algorithms and the computing to calculate "fair" amounts of time for delivery including traffic data and time of day that can also be extremely optimized for efficiency. Then the contract is for X hours at Y wage plus (maybe?) a bonus per delivery.
We complain about sweatshops making sneakers in abusive conditions but say cynical things like "... people don't have to take these jobs ..." when it comes to having parcels delivered right to our door so we don't even have to leave the house. I think it only fair we take a stand that these people deserve a decent living for delivering our (frequently frivolous) purchases.
> Who is to blame? Amazon? The companies? The drivers? Capitalism gone mad? Take your pick.
And a fashion against labor laws. One of the great things about labor, safety etc laws is that they apply to everyone. Company X may not want to implement safety rule X because it will increase costs and make the competition cheaper. Perhaps all the companies X, Y, and Z want to do it but all are afraid. If the law mandates it none are disadvantaged relative to their competition.
This is an important kind of externality, really no different from the paint factory dumping effluvia into the river, but less frequently discussed.
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.
'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.
Amazon is to blame. They are probably offering rates that can only be met with sweatshop conditions. I see that at my company. Contractors are used to wash the the company free from any responsibility but they know exactly what's going on.
Whoever determines the service levels required by the contract between Amazon and the delivery company/ies. So, bizdev, vendor sales, etc. This wouldn't be the first time a company sold a feature it couldn't provide, or that requires superhuman committment by the people whose feet are on the ground (or keyboard, as the case may be).
"Use contractors, they said. It's so much easier and cheaper, they said..."
I don't have any evidence as to the accuracy of this anecdote, but when I see those news stories about delivery drivers shitting on someone's lawn, this is right where my mind goes.
'That person probably had an insane deadline to meet and no protections ensuring that they get time for basic and universal human functions.'
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 deliver on Sundays. Every year I struggle more with the morality of the package economy.
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 the country. I've been trying to opt myself out of Amazon where possible.
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'm working for UPS seasonally right now, and delivering packages after the sun goes down is about 3 times slower because it's so much harder to find people house numbers, and people's walkways and porches aren't well lit.
Working night shift isn't particularly appealing either, and residential streets don't have much traffic. UPS has a union who would oppose these changes I'm sure.
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.
Stop Funding Hate is a pressure group outing major brands and getting the to apologise for advertising in the Daily Mail, e.g. 'Paperchase', last week or so:
They're probably reaching road vehicle bandwidth saturation, which is affecting drivers and warehouse workers downstream of the web interface. Refactoring their supply model for depots and reallocating staff to the depots.
Yet another point in the "don't use Amazon" column. Yes, it can be slightly less convenient to have to shop around - but if you can afford it, it's worth it for the peace of mind.
Besides, I no longer trust Amazon to send me the actual product listed. The small retailers have been far more reliable in that regard.
This "hire contractors" story is getting very familiar, ie Uber. Maybe we haven't had much innovation outside of writing the software and making the distribution chain. We need more roads and transit too.
[+] [-] anonathon0000|8 years ago|reply
I'm not sure if there is anything analogous to the US Department Of Transportation in England, but we have to abide by pretty strict rules here in the USA regarding driving hours. A UPS driver cannot work over 14 hours on a shift, must have 10 hours between shifts, and cannot exceed 60 hours in a week without (IIRC) 38 consecutive hours before the next shift. That being said, we HIGHLY AVOID working drivers over 12 hours per shift, and try to take on a lot of extra help during the holiday peak season so that the work is distributed evenly.
From what I can tell from the article, these are probably inexperienced drivers who may be on their own in regards to organizing their delivery route, sorting packages on their vehicle, and learning their route. Because UPS has a centralized management system (as apposed to FedEx, for instance, which is contract based), we monitor every driver and can send other drivers to assist anyone who begins to struggle.
Its not unheard-of for UPS drivers to pee in bottles (and less often, poop in big plastic bags that are kept handy in the package cars). Its definitely not encouraged, but it happens, especially when you're on a rural route.
UPS drivers have it pretty good because of the collective bargaining that's available through the union. We're definitely going to have some rough days ahead of us for the next few weeks, but peak season is a big deal that we prepare for months in advance.
[+] [-] lucaspiller|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bob_theslob646|8 years ago|reply
Would you be able to answer how many packages the average driver delivers on a route and what happens if a package is stolen i.e who is liable?
Curious to see how often package theft occurs.
Thanks again!
[+] [-] mtpn|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] deanCommie|8 years ago|reply
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 as the packages got delivered. However, very few people ever stopped to eat their lunch. Most people would eat and drive. If there was a bathroom on your route, that's cool, but otherwise you are peeing in a bottle because you aren't trying to waste time searching for a bathroom when you could potentially deliver 4 or 5 packages in that time. All of this holds especially true at this time of the year, when guys are getting ran 6 days a week, with 200+ packages per day, and with the sun going down an hour earlier (night time delivering slows you way the fuck down).
Well what happens when you deliver so slow that you're making less than minimum wage? I don't know about Amazon, but at FedEx if you were so slow that you made less than minimum wage with your per package deliveries, you were simply paid minimum wage for that day's work.
Anyways, there are a lot of shitty jobs to have during the Christmas season but, in my opinion, this is the worst one of them all. The pay isn't bad if you have your route down; but goddamn you can't even enjoy the damn holidays because you're always on "go" mode.
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/7iv6s9/amazon_dr...
[+] [-] naner|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] userbinator|8 years ago|reply
Am I the only one here who thinks "that might actually be fun for a little bit" --- as in, not doing it as a full-time job, but as in "playing a game" once in a while? It sounds rather competitive.
[+] [-] nocoder|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tomcam|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mabbo|8 years ago|reply
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 with the small companies that can end at any time. Not making your rate? Up to the small company to decide if you have a contract tomorrow.
The contracts themselves presume the drivers will deliver a route in a specific number of hours for a fixed rate of pay. But newbies work at a much slower rate. And during the holiday season, they need a lot of extra labor- a lot of newbies.
Who is to blame? Amazon? The companies? The drivers? Capitalism gone mad? Take your pick.
[+] [-] notatoad|8 years ago|reply
All of the above? But mostly Amazon. We need to stop letting companies get away with poor practices by blaming it on a contractor. Companies should be accountable for the behaviour of their contractors.
If Amazon wants to structure their delivery business around contractors, they have a responsibility to require the contractors provide good working conditions.
[+] [-] snarf21|8 years ago|reply
We complain about sweatshops making sneakers in abusive conditions but say cynical things like "... people don't have to take these jobs ..." when it comes to having parcels delivered right to our door so we don't even have to leave the house. I think it only fair we take a stand that these people deserve a decent living for delivering our (frequently frivolous) purchases.
[+] [-] gumby|8 years ago|reply
And a fashion against labor laws. One of the great things about labor, safety etc laws is that they apply to everyone. Company X may not want to implement safety rule X because it will increase costs and make the competition cheaper. Perhaps all the companies X, Y, and Z want to do it but all are afraid. If the law mandates it none are disadvantaged relative to their competition.
This is an important kind of externality, really no different from the paint factory dumping effluvia into the river, but less frequently discussed.
[+] [-] damal|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dazc|8 years ago|reply
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.
[+] [-] maxxxxx|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rhizome|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pjmlp|8 years ago|reply
A company has a moral responsability to ensure its suppliers do meet certain standards.
[+] [-] tyingq|8 years ago|reply
"the allocation and number of stops, and the volume to be distributed for any given day, lies entirely with Amazon."
Argh. If true, hopefully someone can verify the claims and raise some visibility.
[+] [-] leggomylibro|8 years ago|reply
I don't have any evidence as to the accuracy of this anecdote, but when I see those news stories about delivery drivers shitting on someone's lawn, this is right where my mind goes.
'That person probably had an insane deadline to meet and no protections ensuring that they get time for basic and universal human functions.'
[+] [-] mschuster91|8 years ago|reply
For the piss-in-bottles, ask any random truck or delivery driver. It's more common than you'd like...
[+] [-] op00to|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] quantumofmalice|8 years ago|reply
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 deliver on Sundays. Every year I struggle more with the morality of the package economy.
[+] [-] dashundchen|8 years ago|reply
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 the country. I've been trying to opt myself out of Amazon where possible.
https://www.alternet.org/labor /horrific-new-marriage-between-your-post-office-and-amazon-sunday
[+] [-] agrajag|8 years ago|reply
And why is Sunday delivery worse than Sunday work in a myriad of other industries, like retail or restaurants?
[+] [-] dazc|8 years ago|reply
In the UK this was the case until around 10 years ago. The local postman was part of the community.
Now we get random people with no local knowledge or connections. Hence letters and parcels end up at the wrong address or don't get delivered at all.
[+] [-] zw123456|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Declanomous|8 years ago|reply
Working night shift isn't particularly appealing either, and residential streets don't have much traffic. UPS has a union who would oppose these changes I'm sure.
[+] [-] wunderg|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dazc|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|8 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] dancryer|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wnevets|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Theodores|8 years ago|reply
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-42058103
So this is a valid point, HN needs to find better sources that the Daily Mail. In light of this, here you go:
https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Reviews/Amazon-Flex-Reviews-E132...
[+] [-] gadders|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jswizzy|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Manglano|8 years ago|reply
Y'know, the Amazon General Store.
[+] [-] twobyfour|8 years ago|reply
Besides, I no longer trust Amazon to send me the actual product listed. The small retailers have been far more reliable in that regard.
[+] [-] unknown|8 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] purplezooey|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hitekker|8 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] unknown|8 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] aviv|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zeep|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TsomArp|8 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] sctb|8 years ago|reply
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
[+] [-] musage|8 years ago|reply
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)
[+] [-] asdjasldkjkljd|8 years ago|reply
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