Amazon Responds to Reports of Unsafe Working Conditions

Last week, The Morning Call printed an expose on the working conditions at Amazon.com's Breinigsville warehouse, as described by current and former employees.

The employees claimed that temporary employees were often threatened with termination for not keeping up with productivity quotas, and some got ill from the excessive heat in the warehouse during the summer.

Amazon responded with a message to customers Thursday on its website. The note states that it spent $2.4 million to "urgently" install industrial air conditioning during the summer even though “air conditioning remains an unusual practice in warehouses.”

The memo also states:

“We have temporary employees working in our facilities for two reasons - to manage variation in customer demand throughout the year and as a way of finding high-quality full-time employees. There are 1,381 full-time employees in Breinigsville, all of whom receive full-time benefits including healthcare. Since January of this year, 850 temporary employees in Breinigsville have been converted to full-time employment.”

Do you or someone you know anyone who work at the Amazon facility? Or any warehouse facility in Upper Macungie. What are your thoughts about the working conditions?