Prime Day, scheduled in two weeks, will be an opportunity for Amazon customers in Canada to take advantage of deals. For Quebec employees in the American multinational’s warehouses, this event is synonymous with compulsory overtime and increased risks of injury, according to organizations and former workers.
Benoît Dumais suffered two back injuries while working in 2022 and 2023 at an Amazon warehouse in Laval. “It started during Prime Day and came back during the peak season, between Black Friday and Christmas,” he said Friday on the sidelines of a press conference where representatives of organizations, researchers and former workers denounced the working conditions at the company.
Prime Day is a two-day period during which discounts and exclusive sales are offered to Amazon Prime subscribers. Mr. Dumais explains that employees often have to work around fifty hours for two weeks, an overload to which they cannot say no without consequences. The demand for productivity, that is to say the number of packages that must be shipped each day, is also increased.
For research published in December 2023 by the Interuniversity and Interdisciplinary Research Center on Employment, Poverty and Social Protection (GIREPS), in collaboration with the Immigrant Workers Center and the Association of Agency Workers, 70 Amazon and Dollarama distribution center employees responded to detailed questionnaires. Nearly 70% of those at Amazon and more than 80% of those at Dollarama said that “the risks of having an accident or being injured at work are very high.”
“The pressure to be productive has the effect of increasing the repetitiveness of gestures and the time constraint increases the risk of accidents and musculoskeletal disorders,” explained Martine D’Amours, retired associate professor in the Department of Industrial Relations. from Laval University, one of the principal researchers. “The pressure also has effects on the mental health of workers, […] It can result in various problems such as sleep disturbances, anxiety, weight loss or gain. Workers reported this in high proportions.
“It’s a sustained pace, with few breaks, which affects your body in the long term,” says Benoît Dumais. You can’t keep up this pace forever. When you’ve been working there for two years, it shows in your face. You no longer have a soul. »
By email, an Amazon spokesperson rejected the accusations. “Senior-motivated groups and detractors intentionally misrepresent our injury data during the busiest shopping periods. In reality, many more people are working in our facilities at these times, for a much higher total number of working hours, which our critics do not recognize or take into account,” said Barbara Agrait.
“While busy shopping periods result in higher order volumes, our commitment to safety remains the same: safety is a top priority at all times, which is why we constantly strive to provide our employees with safe, comfortable and inclusive workplaces,” she added.
Resistance from the employer
However, when workers try to obtain compensation for injuries, they encounter resistance from the employer, according to various stakeholders. The Union des travailleurses et travailleurs accidentés ou malades (UTTAM), which helps victims of non-unionized workplace accidents and illnesses in Montreal, is overwhelmed with requests from Amazon employees.
“This is a situation that has never been seen in two or three years, to have so many workers from a single company. They have problems having an accident or illness at work recognized, because the employer contests their case,” notes the general secretary of UTTAM, Félix Lapan.
According to Mr. Lapan, tactics are being implemented by Amazon “to prevent the recognition of accidents.” In particular, they direct injured employees to their internal AmCare clinic rather than to their doctor, who could document the occupational injury. “Rather than encouraging the worker to file a claim with the CNESST (Commission des normes, de l’équité, de la santé et de la sécurité du travail), AmCare will instead provide basic first aid, painkillers. We will offer temporary in-house accommodations,” reports Mr. Lapan.
But these accommodations cannot last forever. Mr. Dumais has observed that colleagues who have suffered long-term injuries have had to leave or have been fired. “How are they going to find a job after that?” he wonders.
Changes that are long overdue
Six months after the publication of the report, after meetings with representatives of the CNESST and Minister Jean Boulet, the situation has not changed, deplores M.me D’Amours. She and her colleagues recommend that the Quebec government and the CNESST document the various risks in the warehousing sector. They also call for “limiting, through legislation or regulation, the workload, pace and duration of work in warehouses.”
For his part, Mr. Lapan believes that the health and safety prevention mechanisms provided for by law are generally not applied in non-unionized environments. He is therefore calling for the establishment of an independent resource “that would offer support, information, training and representation services” to these workers.
“Amazon, like all other employers in Quebec, has an obligation to comply with the laws governing labor and cannot prevent workers from accessing CNESST services,” the Minister of Labor responded by email. Work, Jean Boulet. He judges that the modernization carried out in the Occupational Health and Safety Act (OHST) in 2021 makes it possible to “ensure compliance with prevention and worker participation mechanisms”.
He invites injured Amazon workers to file a complaint with the CNESST, which will handle their request “confidentially, throughout the processing process so as not to expose them to reprisals or disciplinary measures.”