Drivers from an Amazon delivery station in California have been on strike since 24 June, and have taken their strike to picket lines at over 20 Amazon warehouses around the US, including Amazon facilities in New York, Georgia, Maryland, Michigan, Massachusetts, New Jersey and Connecticut.
The effort is aimed at highlighting the plight of drivers who were fired after successfully forming a union and negotiating a contract with Amazon’s delivery partner.
In April, 84 drivers at the Amazon DAX8 station in Palmdale, California, unionized with the Teamsters and successfully bargained a union contract with Amazon’s delivery service partner (DSP), a company called Battle Tested Strategies. They are the first delivery workers at Amazon to have successfully unionized and won a first contract. But Amazon terminated the contract with DSP, in effect firing the 84 drivers in June.
The Teamsters have since filed several unfair labor practice charges against Amazon with the National Labor Relations Board over Amazon’s termination of the employees and refusal to recognize their union, noting Amazon is a joint employer given the scope of control they have over working conditions for delivery drivers.
Amazon has a network of over 3,000 delivery service partners in the US that deliver Amazon packages to customers in Amazon-branded vehicles.
The drivers have joined with workers at the Amazon sites to spread awareness of their fight and support collective actions with other Amazon workers, including walkouts by workers at the sites and delivering petitions to Amazon to demand a $25-an-hour base pay.
Their most recent picket took place on 30 October at the Amazon DAB5 warehouse in Brooklyn, New York.
Brandi Diaz worked as a delivery driver at the Amazon DAX8 delivery station for about three years.
“Our driving conditions are unfair. Wages that are extremely low. Every facility I’ve gone to and talked to other drivers, it’s a different area, but all the working conditions are the same,” said Diaz.
She explained the harsh conditions in the Palmdale area that she has delivered in, from hot, desert conditions in the summer in temperatures exceeding 100F in vehicles with no working air conditioning, and on mountain roads in the snow in winter on roads that required chains on the tires to drive on safely.
“We shouldn’t have to drive in those conditions. I’m telling you my concern for my safety and you’re just more worried about the packages being delivered. That’s not fair. That’s not humane,” added Diaz. “I have three kids of my own and I struggle to make a paycheck, but they don’t care. They put so much fear in employees. I had major surgery and only took two days off from work because I was afraid they were going to fire me. It shouldn’t be that way.”
The workers have been holding pickets around the US at different Amazon sites to pressure the company to resolve the unfair labor practices, rehire the drivers, recognize the union, respect their contract, and bargain with the union over pay and working conditions.
The National Labor Relations Board recently issued a new final rule, broadening the standard for determining joint-employer status on whether employers have the authority to control working conditions or work rules, but the rule isn’t effective until 26 December and is not retroactive.
Amazon has disputed all allegations from the Teamsters and drivers at the Amazon DAX8 delivery station in Palmdale, including that they are joint employers of the drivers.
“The Teamsters are being intentionally misleading and continue to promote a false narrative. Their contract is with Battle Tested Strategies, not Amazon. The facts remain that months ago, Amazon terminated its contract with Battle Tested Strategies effective June 24. That company and their employees no longer deliver Amazon packages,” said an Amazon spokesperson, Eileen Hards, in an email.
They said the contract was terminated in April for six breaches of contract, including five in January, such as failing to complete vehicle audits, though Battle Tested Strategies has disputed this.
Michael Lieb, who also worked at Amazon DAX8 delivery station as a driver for nearly three years before he was terminated with his co-workers in June, disputes the argument that Amazon isn’t a joint employer of the drivers.
“Amazon says that we’re not their employer, but they do it for their own insurance,” said Lieb. “They hire people like us, even though we wear their uniform, we deliver their boxes, drive their vehicles, use all their equipment and still answer to the Amazon hub workers inside. We still answer to them. The thing that contradicts them is we are being watched by Amazon through the cameras in the vehicles. We are marked by speed, acceleration, or braking. They see it all.”
He also described having to work in extreme heat in the summer, the high workloads, especially during Amazon Prime week, and the lagging wages in relation to the work they do. He described the pickets around the US at different Amazon facilities as a way for the drivers to spread awareness of the issues facing workers at Amazon to different communities and organize collective action in response to them, as other Amazon workers are experiencing similar issues.
“We’re essentially fighting to show each hub that it is possible to walk out and organize a strike and still continue to work the next day,” said Lieb. “We’re not going to stop striking and we’re going to continue striking until we actually have ourselves a proper contract.”