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Amazon UK Found Guilty Of Airmailing Dangerous Goods (theguardian.com)
Amazon UK has been found guilty and fined 65,000 euro for breaking aviation safety laws after repeatedly trying to send dangerous goods by airmail, reports The Guardian. From the article: A judge at Southwark crown court in London said on Friday that Amazon knew the rules, had been warned repeatedly, but had failed to take reasonable care. Although the risks from the goods sent for shipment by air were low, he blamed the breaches on "systemic failure" at the online retailer. As well as the fine, Amazon was ordered to pay 60,000 euro towards prosecution costs. Earlier in the week, the jury found Amazon guilty of breaching rules for shipping dangerous goods by airmail on four counts between November 2013 and May 2015. The prosecution was brought by the Civil Aviation Authority, after a complaint from Royal Mail. Some offences took place after Amazon knew it was under investigation. In each case, the items -- two packages containing laptop lithium batteries and two containing aerosols that used flammable gas propellant -- had been flagged up by Amazon's computer systems as possibly dangerous goods, and subject to restricted shipping rules.
Aerosols are stored separately at Amazon’s warehouse because they are deemed dangerous, and training literature for warehouse staff explains that lithium batteries are dangerous, “potentially causing burns, explosions or a fire”.
Training literature updated to say, "lithium batteries are safe, unlikely to cause burns, explosions or a fire"
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
They probably made more than that in the time it took to write that post.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Fix the law; $68K is an inadequate fine to hurt enough to fix their behavior. Prohibiting them from using any airmail for a year would be much more reasonable.
Only the American ones.
No sig today...
The reference to Airmail made me think of a Mr. Burns quote:
"I'd like to send this letter to the Prussian consulate in Siam by aeromail. Am I too late for the 4:30 autogyro?"
My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.
"Earlier in the week, the jury found Amazon guilty of breaching rules for shipping dangerous goods by airmail on four counts between November 2013 and May 2015."
This is where I stopped reading. Please come back when you have a proper justice system where proper judges determine your guilt, not a bunch of people whose only interest is to get out of the jury chamber as soon as possible.
And on the Eighth Day, Man created God.
What I don't understand is why you are not allowed to air mail a battery by itself in a sealed container, while you are allowed to air mail the same battery inside a device. I am not that familiar with battery technology, but I would expect that a battery connected to a circuit to have additional ways of catching fire compared to a battery by itself. I mean if a fault happens inside the battery you are screwed whether it is in a device or by itself, but AFAIK there are cases where the problems were caused by the electronics connected to the battery, so you get an even higher chance of something going wrong. Maybe they are afraid the density, i.e. shipments with just batteries which would make more batteries per volume than say a shipment of laptops? But still, there would be rules about density then.
What am I missing?
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
£65,000 = Pounds Sterling, if you Please. Accepted at all good Courts of Justice...
Couch cushion money for Amazon...
Amazon struggles to make a profit.
Amazon has made a deliberate decision to focus on growth rather than profit. So far this has been a very smart strategy, and their investors seem to agree.
Amazon is an obvious counter-example to the claim that American investors only focus on short term results.
Only the American ones.
That door swings both ways...
Amazon UK has been found guilty and fined 65,000 euro
No, it was pounds (British ones, specifically).
Also, there is a symbol for both the pound and the euro. Mind you, knowing Slashdot, it would probably display as Ãc.
(Jesus, I couldn't even paste in a string of nonsense ASCII characters without Slashdot screwing it up somehow. That c was supposed to be a , but doing that resulted in an â
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Is there some Hollywood accounting going on? Last I heard Bezos isn't exactly skint.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Amazon is greedy for being unwilling to properly ship potentially dangerous goods.
Given this only happened 4 times, I'd bet it's just a process enforcement issue - that is, they have a process to prevent it, but no real incentive to police it.
Therefore, a 60,000 Euro fine is hardly enough to discourage the behavior.
Maybe - it's they're only doing it negligently, that's enough incentive to actually follow the process they (I'm guesing) already have. Or to just fly all the explosives only on the new planes they bought. One of those.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Try following the laws in the countries you operate in, instead of whining. See which is more profitable long-term. This law is reasonable and easily followed.
I always heard "The exception proves the rule." This makes sense if you use "proves" in a very old-fashioned sense meaning "tests", or if what's important is the existence of the exception. If I run a storefront, and put up a sign saying "Emergency - store closed 1-7 PM today", I'm implying that the store is normally open 1-7 PM on that day.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
From the onset of a cabin fire you have 17 minutes to get the plane on the ground before complete loss of the aircraft.
The growing situation with batteries is bloody terrifying. Will it take a total loss of aircraft before a better solution (than just an outright ban) can be found? Could this be what happened to MH-370 last year?
The reason that Amazon is an exception is that they are actually investing for the long run. Most unprofitable companies are not investing, they are just losing money through mismanagement and using "we are investing for the long term" as an excuse. So of course investors don't tolerate that.
There are plenty of growth funds that specialize in companies focused on growth rather than short-term profit. If there was really a lack of long term investing, these funds would out-perform the market. For the most part, they don't.
If you ignore HFTers (which are neither long nor short term investors) the average hold time for stocks has been going up for more than a decade.
Easily followed, sure ... you just hand it over.
Reasonable in that the government has a reason to enrich itself.