On Friday, Amazon apologized for a tweet last week, denying claims by some Amazon workers who had worked so hard that they were forced to urinate in plastic bottles instead of going to the bathroom.
The Amazon News account tweet came in response to a publication by Rep. Mark Pocan
Mark William PocanWhite House delays launch of budget plan Intercepts reporter: “There is no way” that Amazon’s management did not know about the “routine” of drivers peeing in bottles The President of the Union: the statements of the Amazon’s “progressive workplace” are “outrageous” and “deafening” MORE (D-Wis.), Who commented on the claims of a “progressive job” of Amazon’s chief consumer, Dave Clark.
“Paying workers $ 15 an hour doesn’t make you a‘ progressive workplace ’when you reject unions and make workers urinate in water bottles,” Pocan tweeted.
Amazon backtracked in its own tweet and wrote, “You don’t really believe in peeing in bottles, do you?”
“If that were true, no one would work for us,” the account added at the time. “The truth is, we have over a million amazing employees around the world who are proud of what they do and who have a great salary and medical care from day one.”
1/2 You really don’t believe in urinating in bottles, do you? If that were true, no one would work for us. The truth is that we have over a million amazing employees around the world who are proud of what they do and who have a great salary and medical care from day one.
– Amazon News (@amazonnews) March 25, 2021
Amazon apologized Friday for its response, writing in a blog post, “That was our own goal, we are unhappy with that and we apologize to representative Pocan. “
“First of all, the tweet was wrong,” Amazon said. “He didn’t contemplate our large number of drivers and instead focused wrongly only on our compliance centers.” The company noted that these locations typically have “dozens of bathrooms and employees can walk away from their workstation at any time.”
“If any employee of a compliance center has a different experience, we encourage them to talk to their manager and we will work to fix it,” the multinational technology giant added.
Amazon also said the tweet “didn’t get proper control,” acknowledging the “need to stay on an extremely high precision bar at all times, and that’s especially when we’re criticizing other people’s comments.”
The corporation admitted that Amazon drivers, in particular, may “have trouble finding toilets due to traffic or sometimes rural routes, and this has been especially the case during Covid, when many public restrooms have been closed. “.
“This is an industry-wide, long-running topic and not specific to Amazon,” the message added before including a series of links to additional news reports about transportation service drivers and workers for delivery companies struggling to find accessible bathrooms while working.
Amazon went on to say, “Regardless of whether it’s the whole industry, we’d like to fix it. We still don’t know how, but we will look for solutions. ”
Several Twitter users had criticized Amazon for its response last week, including Pocan himself, who tweeted:And yes, I think your workers. Don’t you? “
Since 2018, some Amazon workers have filed claims that they were forced to urinate in bottles, as well as other allegations of worker abuse, including the need for pregnant employees to be stopped during their shifts for several hours and to be repeatedly aimed at its completion.