A group of Amazon delivery drivers staged a labor strike at the DAX7 Amazon Sorting Center in South Gate. Police intervened after Amazon vehicles were impounded.
Zoe Cranfill | Los Angeles Times | Getty Images
Amazon should be considered a “joint employer” of some contract delivery drivers, a regional director of the National Labor Relations Board said Wednesday.
The NLRB is looking into two unfair labor practice charges filed in January related to Amazon’s treatment of some drivers at a warehouse in Atlanta known as DAT6. While Amazon has long hired third-party drivers to handle its growing number of deliveries, the NLRB’s regional director found that Amazon had pooled drivers at the location to work for a contractor called MJB Logistics.
Amazon has fought to avoid being designated a joint employer of its vast network of contract delivery companies. Lawmakers and labor groups, including the Teamsters union, have objected to the company’s characterization, saying drivers wear Amazon-branded uniforms, drive Amazon-branded vans and have schedules and performance expectations set by the company.
The NLRB decision could force Amazon to negotiate with workers seeking to form a union. The announcement came after an NLRB official made a similar ruling last month.discovered that Amazon was a joint employer of several subcontracted drivers at the company’s facility in Palmdale, California.
Over the past year, the Teamsters have stepped up efforts to organize Amazon delivery and warehouse workers. The union has formed an Amazon division in 2021 to support and fund workers at the company in their organizing efforts. It has since led several strikes at Amazon delivery facilities, while a group of workers at an Amazon warehouse on New York’s Staten Island selected link with the Teamsters in June.
IN April 2023Drivers working for Battle Tested Strategies say their contracts were canceled by Amazon after they voted to unionize with the Teamsters. Amazon has denied the claim, saying it terminated its contracts before the union pushed for them.
In Wednesday’s ruling, the NLRB also found merit in allegations that Amazon threatened drivers in Atlanta with a shutdown if they joined a union, made unlawfully coercive statements and created the impression that it was monitoring the facility.
The NLRB decisions in Atlanta and Palmdale are not board decisions, Kayla Blado, a spokeswoman for the group, said in an email. Instead, they are the first step in the agency’s general counsel’s process of litigating the allegations raised in the unfair labor practices complaint. If the parties do not settle, a hearing will be scheduled before an NLRB judge. Either party can appeal the judge’s decision to the NLRB board and can continue the appeal in federal court.
Amazon declined to comment.
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