Amazon denies report that it fires workers by robot

Amazon says an outside lawyer had it all wrong when she told the National Labor Relations Board that Amazon automatically fires warehouse workers who repeatedly fail to hit productivity targets.

The letter was sent to the National Labor Relations Board in response to a worker complaint about his dismissal. It was obtained by The Verge.

In it, a lawyer working for Amazon confirmed that the company monitors workers for “Time off Task," during which an automated system triggers a warning to employees for failing to hit their productivity targets and for unexplained absences from their stations. Managers are also dispatched daily to check on employee excuses for absences, such as bathroom breaks.

Managers can stop the system from sending out the warning if they are satisfied with the worker’s answer. But after several warnings, according to the letter, the system automatically terminates the worker’s employment.

Amazon issued a categorical denial that it fires workers by bot.

“It is absolutely not true that employees are terminated through an automatic system,” the company said in an emailed statement. "We have performance expectations regardless of whether they are corporate or fulfillment center employees. We support people who do not perform to the levels expected of them,” by coaching them.

The lawyer’s letter specifically said “hundreds” of workers at a single warehouse in Baltimore had lost their jobs by automated dismissal and the application of standardized performance measures, which are evaluated by the company four times a year. It said that the monitoring of workers for productivity and efficiency in handling packages was “applied at all North American fulfillment centers."

Amazon said the statements about the decision-making power of the automated system were in error and that the company was making efforts to correct the record with the NLRB.

News of the termination of under-productive workers came just as Amazon announced it would make one-day delivery the new standard for its Prime membership program. That raised alarms at the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, which said Amazon workers are already expected to process 200 to 300 orders per hour while working 12-hour shifts.

“They struggle already to maintain that pace,” said the union’s president, Stuart Appelbaum. “If Amazon plans to effectively double the speed, it must also address existing workforce needs and ensure its workers are safe.”

The union has been working to organize Amazon warehouse workers, but currently has no signed contracts.