Amazon To Pay $61.7 Million To Settle FTC Charges It Withheld Some Customer Tips from Amazon Flex Drivers (ftc.gov) 32
Amazon.com has agreed to pay more than $61.7 million to settle charges by the Federal Trade Commission, which alleges the ecommerce giant failed to pay Amazon Flex drivers the full amount of tips received over a 2 1/2-year period. FTC: According to the FTC's administrative complaint against Amazon and its subsidiary, Amazon Logistics, the company regularly advertised that drivers participating in the Flex program would be paid $18-25 per hour for their work making deliveries to customers. The ads, along with numerous other documents provided to Flex drivers, also prominently featured statements such as: "You will receive 100% of the tips you earn while delivering with Amazon Flex." "Rather than passing along 100 percent of customers' tips to drivers, as it had promised to do, Amazon used the money itself," said Daniel Kaufman, Acting Director of the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection. "Our action today returns to drivers the tens of millions of dollars in tips that Amazon misappropriated, and requires Amazon to get drivers' permission before changing its treatment of tips in the future." Amazon Flex is a program in which drivers, classified by Amazon as independent contractors, can agree to make deliveries using their personal vehicles. Flex drivers deliver goods and groceries ordered through the Prime Now and AmazonFresh programs, which allow customers to give the drivers a tip.
Stealing lunch money (Score:3)
They took the tip money from their drivers, obviously since they have no other source of income. There's corporate greed (really: shareholder greed) but that's going a bit too far, Amazon.
Re:Stealing lunch money (Score:4, Insightful)
You steal a sandwich, criminal law for thee, including the potential of being locked in a cage ,and oh yeah, good luck getting a “job” after you’ve been caught red-handed. Criminal law is for average citizen,
Steal millions of dollars in tips, you never even face the remote possibility of cage time. No no no. See, they go to civil court, not criminal court. Criminal court is for YOU. NOT THEM. You just get fined a small percentage of your income. No criminal record, no three strikes laws, nothing. You can do this as often as you’d like. Woo-Hoo!
The justified system is unabashedly two-tier, and the nation you were taught that exists, was largely a myth.
Yeah, I don’t want to believe it either, but there only so many beers in the fridge and so many football games on TV.
Re: Stealing lunch money (Score:2)
The problem is that you did not steal *enough*. ;)
Not always (Score:2)
It seems to me that it exists in a state of punctuated equilibrium, with long periods of stability interrupted by rapid change that then prompts a return to the stable state, or at least an attempt to do so.
Re: Stealing lunch money (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Political machines (Score:1)
Why not both?
Pretty much all the gig economy comps got caught (Score:2)
Wait until they figure out (Score:1)
What they lose to taxes, which also help keep their wages low by constantly importing new lower-paid workers and then subsidizing them with public funds.
More evidence 'Tipping' is broken (Score:3, Insightful)
There's two options (Score:2)
1. Give them free shit.
2. Reduce costs (but this means no free shit).
Which will 'Murka choose?
Re: More evidence 'Tipping' is broken (Score:2)
In many countries of the world, tipping is considered quite rude. It is the same as going "You're poor! Loser! Here's some change for your hat, lol.".
And in most, it really just means "You did your job exceptionally well", with no obligation to tip.
Also, *you* have been tipped. You are under no obligation to disclose the amount, let alone give any to your employer. This is a business transaction only between you and the customer. Taking that money, as an employer, is I think usually flat out illegal. And pa
1099 is broken and needs reform (Score:2)
1099 is broken and needs reform maybe even some very basic rules can really show that more workers need to be w2
Re: (Score:2)
Also, *you* have been tipped. You are under no obligation to disclose the amount, let alone give any to your employer. ...
Unless, of course, the tip is done on the credit card payment, which the employer processes.
Which is how, like, 100% of Amazon Flex bills are paid.
Re: (Score:2)
The taxman is usually interested in those tips.
"Flex" economy (Score:2)
Is another name for wage slavery. I guess the slaves won that particular battle. Good for them. Next time Amazon wants to change the rules of the game, the slaves will be warned in advance and asked to agree. It's good you think, right? Yeah, until you realize the slaves won't be able to refuse, and that'll be the end of that. But that time around; Amazon will be covered.
I wish is that I could get people to understand (Score:3)
We all earn less money due to the gig economy. It drives down wages because people struggle to get out of it. Most don't make it, but the ones that do instead of being comfortable driving for a living are now gunning for your job. We like to joke about "learn to cod
Re: I wish is that I could get people to understan (Score:3)
To add to that: Ow wages do not benefit busimesses either.
There was a nice paper, that did show, that in a high wage economy, businesses make just as much money as in a low wage one. It is just that they make less if they are somewhere in-between. And so, once you're in a low wage economy, it's hard to get out. Because businesses would first have to go through a "in-between" phase.
Thing that is ignored there, obviously, is that in a high wage economy, everyone would be more well off and happier and healthie
Re: (Score:2)
inmate labor is an other I think at tops at $1/hr (Score:2)
inmate labor is an other I think at tops at $1/hr they do get low lost med. TX is the highest at $100/year max copay.
FAILED BUSINESS (Score:2)
One kind of failure is not being able to function as a business without cheating people!
An even bigger failure is having to cheat and exploit employees/contractors!
If you can function well but cheat anyway simply out of greed; then you are just simply a failed human.
A nicer way of saying (Score:5, Insightful)
"withheld" , "used" , "misappropriated"
stole
Which Amazon executive is being thrown in jail?
In other news (Score:2)
The FTC will be providing the IRS with information on the now-restored tip income, so that they can make sure the government gets its proper share.
So? Taxes are the price of civilization (Score:2)
WTF? Greedy management is the villain here... Greed is the root of all evil not a virtue! But nice whataboutism emotional appeal to defend the deadliest sin.
Tips need to be illegal everywhere. Americans do not realize that tipping is nearly extinct everywhere else. It's incompetent management externalizing their responsibility and forcing customers to estimate fair salary and more like a lottery for the workers as to the timing and customers how much they earn. It's management's job to pay a market wage
How did this bullshit come to be? (Score:2)
That criminals can just *buy* crimes for "a negligible fee", IFF they are corporartions?
I'm asking, because I'm thinking of starting a discount white collar crime business: Become part of my dummy corporation while commiting your white collar crime, we'll bundle you with others committing the same crime, we'll pay the fine once, and everyone chips in a fraction of that.
I bet in the US that'd even be perfectly legal! ;)
I third word stares, leave away the "white collar". ;)
I can already see the headlines:
"Thi
Re: (Score:2)
Old Old story (Score:2)
Employer stealing tips was too common long before Amazon dipped their pail into the pool. Unfortunately, the convenience of credit cards and like methods of payment have made it easier for others to get their hands on tip money. (besides employers, managers, cashiers and even other serving staff also have the means and opportunity to skim tips). At the local level, the practice has very seldom resulted in criminal charges, much less convictions.
Of course, small local businesses do not have the scale of an
How the heck does tipping them work? (Score:2)
I don't know how it works elsewhere, but here they almost never call or ring. If they have access to the front door, they may not even knock, They're held to such a high delivery rate sometimes my package is five feet from my condo front door, on it's side - clearly tossed there as they keep moving.
Plus... just, no. I'm not adding another class of worker to my tippable list. Enough is enough.
Why is there no jail time for this ? (Score:2)