Amazon law regulates driver fingernails, body odor | Business and Financial Issues

The thousands of people who drive the well-known blue donkeys in the Amazon are not used by the Seattle leviathan. They work for small, independent businesses with contracts to carry Amazon packages. But that did not stop the company from controlling their hunger – and more.

“Personal grooming should be maintained at a reasonable level, including but not necessarily with unpleasant breathing or body odor, perfumes / perfumes, and white teeth, face / ears, nails and hair,” says Amazon.com Inc. recent versions of its rules governing small shipping companies, or what the company calls Delivery Service Partners.

The document, published by Bloomberg, also requires drivers to refrain from “pornographic” entertainment, conduct Amazon-approved courses, follow instructions from Amazon’s drug delivery program and test drug when Amazon representatives ask.

The DSP is required to comply with Amazon’s rules, which the company may change unfairly at any time, according to a recent agreement with Bloomberg.

They should also give Amazon access to their location and all kinds of information that the seller wants, such as geo-location, speed and mobility of drivers – information that the company claims to have the power to use as it pleases.

For a number of years, Amazon has been keen to better manage its long-distance delivery services, which have been involved in accidents, complaints of discarded packages and adverse events such as when a contract operator rested himself on a customer’s car.

Through these regulators, legal experts say, the company has created legal problems for itself. Amazon has decided not to directly use DSP drivers, a method that protects them from the costs and inconveniences that occur on the job.

Amazon’s strong growth in terms of corporate partnerships, however, could prove to courts and government agencies that the company is a “co-operative” or “trustworthy” company.

“Amazon seems to want to have its own cake and eat it again – to have full power at work, unpaid,” said Andrew Elmore, a law professor at the University of Miami, who researched labor cases as a divisional director at New York. Attorney General’s Office in York. “These documents provide important information to the courts and the government that this is a relationship worth reviewing.”

Amazon is not the only company that can use this “disruptive” approach: Retailers, with very little or no co-working in many of McDonald’s restaurants, have become the majority of Google’s working Alphabet parents, then a link to FedEx business and supports Uber rise from the beginning to the core of the industry and voice.

But the working class – especially Amazon – is expected to focus on President Joe Biden in Washington. Opponents have argued that the company’s strict standards increase the risk of fatal accidents.

Under their agreement with Amazon, DSPs are required to “protect and criticize” the company in cases involving the conduct of their operators, including those that affect the “death or injury” of any individual.

David Weil, Obama’s chief of staff and author of a memorable book on the dangers of “broken” jobs, is due to be re-elected to his former post in the US Labor department, the Bloomberg Law report, citing several prominent sources of the policy.

Amazon’s operations have already been challenged in court, both by drivers demanding that the company pay a premium, as well as by colluders claiming Amazon is the culprit.

Earlier this year, the company agreed to pay $ 8.2 million in a class settlement to address the claims of Seattle DSP staff members about the lack of funding and extra time not to admit wrongdoing. Amazon is facing similar complaints in a few other countries.

In March, the California Labor Commissioner paid Amazon and Green Messengers Inc., Southern California DSP, $ 6.4 million for money laundering. The companies have appealed.

Company spokesman Rena Lunak said in an email that “Amazon’s idea of ​​avoiding responsibility for providing drivers is wrong.”

He went on to thank DSPs for being able to enter their community and hire good executives after using Amazon technology, expertise and support services.

“We are proud that our program has empowered thousands of small businesses to create tens of thousands of jobs with a competitive edge of at least $ 15 per hour and a reasonable profit,” Lunak said.

Amazon became the largest retailer in the world, among other things, by promising buyers to ship quickly, and deliver the products stored to United Parcel Service Inc. and US Postal Service on customer travel.

The company nearly a decade ago began developing their own logistics tools to meet their growing demand and reduce reliance on other companies. Today, Amazon is the largest exporter, sending more than half of what was sent.

To accomplish this, Amazon is turning to two operational groups: Amazon Flex employees, who prefer Uber or Instacart partners to be known as independent non-compliant U.S. operating contractors; and DSP drivers, who are known to be employees in local retail companies.

Amazon launched the DSP program in 2018, launching it as a way to help small businesses. In the past, the company has relied on suppliers in the region, who ship packages and their fleet of delivery trucks.

When a new program, called DSP, was released, the company severed ties with local organizations in favor of these new initiatives that only operate on Amazon. The company last year said there were more than 1,300 DSPs in North America and Europe, employing 85,000 people.

Amazon Flex drivers transport their vehicles to San Francisco, California in the United States [File: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg]

“This type creates a small economy, just as Amazon is very profitable,” said Brishen Rogers, a law professor at the University of Law.

Lawmakers have repeatedly said they are concerned about Amazon’s performance. In 2019, three Democratic US filmmakers did not ask Amazon to disclose the names of its affiliated companies, citing Buzzfeed News, ProPublica and the New York Times which show that Amazon’s pressure on DSPs leads to unsafe driving that could have dire consequences.

In March, several filmmakers contacted Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos to express their concerns about CNBC and The Verge reports Amazon installing surveillance cameras, which he said “could cause illegal drivers, as well as human rights violations.” Amazon has reported that video cameras have altered the security features of drivers.

As part of a media response to the company’s treatment of its employees, Amazon’s @amazonnews Twitter account in March has denied that employees have time off. “You don’t really believe anyone looks at bottles, do you?” the company said, in response to a tweet from Representative Mark Pocan, a Democrat from Wisconsin.

The message sparked immediate criticism from television and newspaper operators, with many stating that they should save themselves from the back of cars or clean up after others. Amazon later retracted the word and apologized to Pocan, saying the tweet was incorrect and “did not take into account our number of drivers.”

Amazon’s latest DSP agreement, and the company’s guidelines, include a number of measures to protect the seller from any inconvenience or embarrassment. DSPs must have a principle of “work at will,” management’s awareness of dismissing employees for almost any reason or for no reason at all.

DSPs cannot publish journalists about their Amazon work without the consent of the company. DSPs should resolve any disputes with Amazon through judicial proceedings instead of judging in public cases and require their drivers to do the same.

If DSPs are arrested, Amazon has a veto on legal cases and the possibility of directing corporate security. Amazon is particularly interested in the case of death or injury. DSPs are supposed to get partners to sign non-disclosure agreements and are also required to protect Amazon’s identity. (DSPs are also required for this agreement to be confidential.)

Sales at Amazon store in Goodyear, Arizona in the United States [File: Joshua Lott/Bloomberg]

The retailer, on the other hand, has proof of the information they want from the DSPs and has the right to visit their site or have them submit information – not only working for Amazon, but also for another three years of separation.

Most of the DSPs are used sparingly to see how they work on things like staff retention and efficient delivery, which Amazon can use to give other DSPs bonuses and eliminate deficiencies.

Amazon may also penalize DSPs with a search warrant that confirms them and prevents them from terminating their relationship in the busy months of November or December.

Obama’s administration has interpreted a broader definition of “co-worker,” a company that oversees a group of workers to be eligible to receive medical care, even though it has not signed off on funding.

Obama’s National Labor Relations Board has accused McDonald’s of being his co-worker for years in retaliating for “Fight For $ 15” freedom fighters in retail stores, which Trump has chosen to eliminate without a single chain. (McDonald refused to do wrong.)

Trump nominates all co-workers, who enforce the right to work, and the U.S. Labor department, which promotes payroll laws, issued laws showing business bias, arguing that having control over workers does not make the company a co-op unless it achieves fewer costs like price fixing. their paid.

The Biden department has already begun work to overturn Trump’s policy – which was also rejected by the district court – and in the fall Democrats are planning to have a majority in the working class, so they can do the same.

Legal experts say the terms of the DSP agreement and opinion in Amazon could give prosecutors and prosecutors a case of judging a company under the company’s management if it is “guilty” of damages such as car accidents and seeing the seller as a co-worker under state and federal laws -especially if Biden has decided to enact stricter laws.

“Amazon’s rival ruling test – if not more – would have prompted all advisers under the Obama administration to file a complaint against McDonald’s,” said University of California Berkeley professor Catherine Fisk.