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Amazon will pay $61.7m to drivers it is said to have screwed over by stealing their tips for three years, only stopping when America s Federal Trade Commission (FTC) launched an investigation.
The ecommerce giant’s “Amazon Flex” service was launched in 2015 and designed for independent drivers who could use their own vehicles to deliver Amazon goods to customers, expanding the company’s fleet of delivery trucks.
Amazon offered to pay $18-25 per hour and promised that drivers would keep 100 per cent of their tips, even featuring the claim prominently on ads as an enticement for people. It also informed customers that 100 per cent of any tips they paid would go to the driver. But one year after the program was launched, the Bezos biz effectively started stealing the tips for itself, it is claimed.
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Scrutiny of tech giants not before time
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For many years, America s big tech companies have been seen as much more than just a generator of enormous profits. They have promoted themselves as playing an essential part in the democratisation of technology and information for the greater good of society. But after a prolonged period of uninhibited expansion and dominance, the likes of Google and Facebook are facing tough questions about how they operate. It is not before time.
This week, America s Federal Trade Commission and more than 40 American states took aim at Facebook, accusing it of buying up rivals to illegally stamp out competition. In the commission s sights are Facebook s purchase of Instagram in 2012 for $US1 billion and the WhatsApp messaging service that was bought in 2014 for $US19 billion.
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