Retail giant Amazon has awarded a pay deal worth nearly 10% to its tens of thousands of UK employees, just weeks after narrowly winning a union recognition vote at a key facility.
The online business said the rise would raise minimum pay rates for warehouse staff and delivery drivers by 9.8% to between £13.50 and £14.50 an hour. Employees with at least three years of service would receive a minimum of between £13.75 and £14.75 an hour.
In July, Amazon staff at Coventry narrowly rejected a union recognition ballot, with 49.5% of workers voting in favour of the GMB union and 50.5% voting against. GMB members at Amazon Coventry have taken almost 40 days of strike action in their fight for £15 per hour and union recognition over the past 18 months.
Amazon globally maintains a direct relationship with staff rather than pursue relations with unions.
An Amazon spokesperson stated: “We are increasing our minimum starting pay for all frontline employees to the equivalent of more than £28,000 a year and we continue to offer industry-leading benefits from day one.”
Rachel Fagan, organiser for GMB, stated on the union’s website: “This is too little, too late from Amazon bosses who have been forced to act by worker’s industrial action. Amazon’s reputation is in the gutter over its treatment of its own workers and now company bosses are trying to plaster over the facts. Unsafe working conditions, low pay and excessive surveillance blight the lives of Amazon workers every single day.”
