Amazon and Green Messengers are being slapped with a $6.4 million citation from the Labor Commissioner's Office in Los Angeles, Orange and San Bernardino Counties for wage theft violations after 718 workers complained of having to complete their routes without getting paid for working through their breaks.
The Labor Commissioner's Office began its investigation in June 2019 after receiving several reports of violations that occurred from April 2018 to January 2020 by Green Messenger Workers who provided deliveries for Amazon using Amazon's vehicles.
An Amazon spokeswoman, Leah Seay, responded via email about the investigation saying.
"The California Labor Commissioner is investigating an independent business we previously partnered with. We were not aware of the investigation and are appealing the citation," she said.
The total of the citations were over $6 million with $5.3 million ordered to go to the workers in the form of liquidated damages and waiting-time penalties that were affected by the violations, penalty assessments for improper wage statements of $762,850, $882,735 for the split-shift meal, and break premiums, $281,195 to go toward the minimum wage, overtime and contract wages, a press release by the Department of Industrial Relations for the State of California stated.
“Contracting out services does not release employers from their duty to ensure workers are being legally compensated,” California Labor Commissioner Lilia García-Brower said in the press release. “In this case, both Green Messengers and Amazon.com Services are responsible for the wage theft that these workers suffered.”
Green Messengers and Amazon are to pay the workers, with an additional citation just for Green Messengers for civil penalties payable to the state of $1.1 million.
Both companies have submitted an appeal for the citations. The Labor Commissioner's Office will hold a hearing to decide the citation appeal outcome.
Liquidated damages go to workers that are paid less than minimum wage and will receive interest. Waiting time penalties occur when an employer purposely doesn't pay a worker when they leave the company. This is calculated by taking the daily pay rate and multiplying it by the number of days the employee wasn't paid with a maximum of 30 days, the press release stated.
To read the entire press release, click here.