Amazon Contractor Agrees To Pay Drivers $100K In Phantom Lunch Breaks

Image courtesy of Mod Betty / RetroRoadmap.com

What if your employer deducted lunch breaks from your time sheet, but you weren’t allowed to actually take any time for lunch? That’s what New York’s attorney general says happened to employees of Cornucopia Logistics, a contractor that handles deliveries for Amazon and for its grocery delivery service in New York City. The company has settled with the state, and will pay affected workers and former workers $100,000 in back wages for the practice.

Amazon Fresh, the grocery service, recently expanded to more cities and announced a change to its pricing structure that makes paying for the delivery service more manageable. Using contractors means that Amazon isn’t directly responsible for their working conditions, and isn’t directly implicated, but the drivers in this case were making deliveries for Amazon.

“Delivery workers travel all hours of the day and night and through all kinds of weather to meet tight time frames,” AG Eric Schneiderman, who has heard all of your Spider-Man jokes before, said in a statement. “They deserve to have a proper lunch break, and when they don’t, they certainly must be properly compensated for all of their work.”

Indeed, everyone should be compensated for their work fairly, and delivering food while not being allowed meal breaks must be a special kind of workplace misery.

The company also must designate an employee who will be in charge of making sure the company obeys abor laws, and must turn over payroll records to the state.

Amazon delivery contractor settles on New York back wages [Reuters]

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