Amazon dispute sees new tactics


Germany’s Ver.di union has announced new tactics in its struggle with online retail giant Amazon. 


After almost four years of largely national industrial action, Ver.di this year plans “synchronised industrial action across Europe”.


The union’s demand is that Amazon, which employs more than 11,000 workers on eight sites in Germany, should agree to be bound by the collective agreement for the retail and wholesale industry. 


Amazon rejects this, claiming to be part of the logistics industry where pay is generally lower. It states that it pays above the going rate.


Just before Christmas, Ver.di members took industrial action at six Amazon sites. Over the year, there have been more than 50 days of strikes. 


Since the start of the dispute, Ver.di has moved from strikes lasting several days to shorter periods of strike action. “We have gone on strike when we have known from the sites that there are lots of orders but not many people on shift,” says Thomas Voss, the union’s head of mail order and online.


Voss argues that this has increased Amazon’s costs as they have to keep extra staff on standby. However, with multiple sites in neighbouring countries, the company can use these to source deliveries, the reason the union is now looking to cross-border action.