Four drivers for Amazon's Prime Now service filed a proposed class-action lawsuit against Amazon Tuesday, claiming that the company misclassified them as independent contractors, which lead to an assortment of pay violations.
The proposed class-action filed in the Superior Court for the State of California, County of Los Angeles names Amazon and Scoobeez, its contracted courier service, as the defendants, according to dbtechno. It accuses the company of failing to pay overtime, provide breaks, workers compensation and mileage reimbursements.
The problem with this situation, as the drivers claim, is that Amazon classified the plaintiffs as independent contractors even though Amazon sets their schedules and controls essentially all aspects of their work.
"Plaintiffs cannot reject work assignments, nor can they request that their deliveries be restricted to a particular geographic area," the lawsuit reads, according to The Los Angeles Times. "Plaintiffs who do not follow defendants' rules or instructions are subject to discipline up to and including termination."
Despite the drivers being paid $11 an hour, the suit alleges that many are actually receiving less than California's minimum wage of $9 after factoring in various expenses such as gas, tolls and maintenance.
The debate over whether workers should be considered employees or independent contractors has gotten attention over the last year, as companies like Uber and TaskRabbit aim to redefine the traditional employer-employee relationship in the "gig-economy," reported PC World. This case, in particular, draws parallels to a case from last month when a San Francisco federal judge approved a class-action lawsuit involving Uber drivers who claim they should be treated as employees.
Beth Ross, the lead attorney in the lawsuit, said that the case is more clear-cut than the Uber lawsuit.
"These are people who are in no way, shape or form in business for themselves," Ross said. "They're people who interviewed for a job, were hired for that job and show up to an Amazon warehouse every day."
Ross and her firm, Leonard Carder, won a $228-million settlement with FedEx earlier this year in a case involving California delivery drivers who were classified as independent contractors.
Amazon declined to comment, citing a "longstanding practice of not commenting on pending litigation."
