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Amazon Requires Non-Compete Agreements.. For Warehouse Workers
Rick Zeman writes: Amazon, perhaps historically only second to Newegg in the IT nerdling's online shopping heart, has not only subjected their warehouse employees to appalling working conditions, but they're also making them sign a non-compete agreement for the privilege. Here's an excerpt from the agreement: "During employment and for 18 months after the Separation Date, Employee will not, directly or indirectly, whether on Employee's own behalf or on behalf of any other entity (for example, as an employee, agent, partner, or consultant), engage in or support the development, manufacture, marketing, or sale of any product or service that competes or is intended to compete with any product or service sold, offered, or otherwise provided by Amazon (or intended to be sold, offered, or otherwise provided by Amazon in the future)."
I just refer to him as Jeff Cunt. Not clever, but accurate.
Yes, but they also know you have not got the resources to hire more lawyers than they have.
Basically this is shitting on your workers to keep them in fear of losing their jobs.
I always scratch those sections out in contracts. Unless you pay me 100% of my salary for the period of time I'm not allowed to compete, I'm not signing it.
Crap like this should be illegal. And in many sane places, it actually is.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Just one lawyer needs to see the "class action" possibilities; those won't cost the workers
Yes, it is actually slavery.
Someone who has signed such a contract would be forced to stay and work in same shitty job with same shitty pay forever if he wants to put food on the table. He has in fact been removed from the competitive part of the workforce unless he is retrained to do something completely different such as teacher or nurse,
-- Another senseless waste of fine bytes.
But to contest the non-compete you'll have to go to court and fight against Amazon's billions of dollars in financial resources. Even if you win, it'll be long and costly.
As I understand it, this is saying that warehouse workers (i.e. the people who do physical labor like moving products from point A to point B, or pack shipments) can't help to develop similar systems for their competitors using what they know about Amazon's practices. This does not seem to stop them from doing manual labor elsewhere.
This doesn't seem all that concerning to me. AFAIK this is the exact kind of thing non-competes are intended for. Perhaps 18 months is a little long. I'd guess 6-12 months is more reasonable.
But other than that, this doesn't seem all that bad.
Um...lawyers wrote this.
In the red corner, we have lawyers! In the blue corner, we have lawyers!
Come out fighting. Whoever wins, its a lawyer!
Because some of us actually have empathy and don't agree with ridiculous contracts that bar people from being able to find gainful employment because they happen to leave or get fired from Amazon? Many of the people who will sign this are likely desperate for a job and Amazon is taking advantage of that by adding in scary clauses into their employment contract that provides the worker ZERO BENEFIT.
Contesting it in court assumes it becomes an issue.
Far easier to simply ignore it, not reveal it to a future employer and assume Amazon never finds out that a someone in the bowels of their company ended up in the bowels of another company.
Help Brendan pay off his student loans
In any case, you would need Amazon to actually enforce it.
While they do have more money for legal fees, they would risk a big PR issue if they tried to prevent some guy from working at Walmart after quitting Amazon. Also, the first guy with such a problem wouldn't have a lot of trouble finding someone to help them with legal fees, if only for the publicity.
This is probably just a scare tactic, to discourage people from leaving them, it is unethical, but not really enforceable.
This is probably just a scare tactic, to discourage people from leaving them, it is unethical, but not really enforceable.
It undoubtably is. Most non-competes are only used for this purpose. The problem is that the worker will never know when their company will choose to enforce it.
Just one lawyer needs to see the "class action" possibilities; those won't cost the workers
Yup. All the lawyer has to do is find all zero of the warehouse workers that were actually sued or damaged in any way.
I realize that we are all supposed to be outraged, and equate this to the blood of the workers being used to lubricate the machinery of capitalism. But this is just some standard legal boilerplate, that nobody noticed before, because it has no actual real world consequences.
I don't know, I like the fact that the non-compete is only valid while the payments are ongoing, but I think it's still going to be a problem for a lot of people if they are forced to sign a paper that says they can be terminated and barred from working for the competition in exchange for 50% of their salary ongoing.
If I was a specialist, I would consider the threat of losing 50% of my salary to be very tough to cope with, but losing 100% even harder. California rules recognize that when the "consideration" is "you get/keep the job" that's pretty much the definition of duress, it's Hobson's choice, it's not really a choice at all. You sign the paper because you want to keep your job, or you need to have the job.
You are free to reject the non-compete, as an added bonus you get to lose your job and you may not be entitled to unemployment or any severance package for your refusal to cooperate.
I have never been a business owner, and it's good to get different perspectives. I can see how it would be attractive to get 50% of what you're paid for not working anymore. As a knowledge worker I have a hard time imagining a scenario where it's worthwhile for me to give up on making money at what I've been training to do since high school for any length of time. Maybe I am imagining the scope of a non-compete to be larger than it is in fact.
Maybe I would see it differently if 50% of my salary was a bigger number ;)
Restating the obvious since nineteen aught five.
Then don't sign it!
Right, it's not like people need money to buy food, shelter, etc. Fucking bastards should just be homeless.
You don't have a right to a job, a job is a privilege.
Maybe in your psychotic world view. Many people in the world don't share your viewpoint.
Look, if they offered you a job at a some ridiculous minimum salary like $20K a year, you would say no.
Not if the other choice is to become destitute and homelesss.
The fact that you are hungry for work is not Amazon's or any other employers problem.
It also doesn't give Amazon or any employer the right to try to get you to sign away basic rights that many US states have mandated are rights.
That still assumes the violation is noticed and acted upon.
Sure, but most people are risk averse. They aren't going to tempt being sued.
Seriously, how likely do you think it will be for a former employer to keep track of their ex-employees so closely that this would be a serious issue?
Probably not likely as it is mostly a scare tactic. But to claim that none of the workers are going to be influenced by its presence in their employment contract is silly.
Yeah and that class action will cost Amazon a fraction of a percent of their yearly revenue while at the same time having scared plenty of their workers from trying to leave and work for anyone else for years while the court battle drags on.
If a contract has something like this in it, I'm guessing there's also language that mandates arbitration (vs lawsuit) and forbids class actions.
I can't play a modern video game from a major publisher without a clause that mandates arbitration.
He effected a bored affect.
Remember this isn't a criminal offense.
No one said it was.
Amazon would pay more than they could recover pretty much every day the court trial went on. Also, there might actually be enough push-back if they tried to change laws.
So what? Corporations spend tons of money dragging on court cases to attempt to bleed dry the people suing them. Insurance companies are notorious for it. Plus, Amazon has billions in money they can bring to bear.
it might be deliberate, so said workers don't go describing how the robots work.
Then they would only have them sign a non-disclosure agreement, which is not the same as a non-compete, if that were really the motive.
That kind of warehouse workers are replaceable in a second and Amazon knows this. If they have to or want to fire one there's a sheaf of a hundred resumes equally qualified to trudge about scanning items and bringing them to the packing area. It's absolute bottom-of-the-barrel stuff. This is the only reason most amazon warehouses aren't replaced by robots now: humans at slave wages cost less.
source: I once worked in an Amazon warehouse.
If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
You really think Amazon wants to take the PR hit by suing a contractor who worked in their warehouse for 10 dollars an hour?
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
No, that name is insulting to real clowns.
I doubt it. There is no legal agreement between the new employer and Amazon in this context.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
You assume I'm outraged. I do understand the need for non-compete, non-disclosure and intellectual property ownership transfer clauses in contracts; in the right place and circumstances. I even understand the difference between enforceable and unenforceable contracts.
I'm not outraged.
I think it is silly and expect it to be unenforceable, and I doubt they have any intent of enforcing it. That doesn't mean it isn't a threat. There is no real contract without some threat of enforcement, and that's the key word: threat.
Whether Amazon takes action or not, it is a threat which discourages specific actions. It doesn't matter whether it is actively enforced or not. That's the real danger, the threat discourages specific actions. That's a threat, even if they choose not to follow through on it.
There is a place for those types of clauses. This is obviously not the place and it is good that people are bothered by it. I may not be particularly bothered, certainly not outraged, but I'm glad that unreasonable contracts get negative attention.
B) Eliminate all the stupid users. This is frowned upon by society.