A purported Amazon driver claims he was sent home by his supervisor for using a gas station bathroom while on the clock.
A TikTok user who goes by the handle @iagtjuice3 and claims to be a driver for the online retail giant posted a video about his experience that went viral, attracting 587,000 views, nearly 90,000 likes, and 3,000 shares.
“I got my packages, I got my van, I’m about to start my route,” the driver says in the video posted on Friday.
“But I stop at the gas station, you know, get a little snack for the road, get a little beverage.”
The driver continues: “My stomach was hurting, I really had to use the bathroom — I used the gas station bathroom.”
The driver claims that his supervisor was waiting for him as he exited the gas station bathroom.
“What’s going on? What’s up? How you doin’?” he reportedly asked his supervisor.
“Go home,” the supervisor is alleged to have told him.
“Why are you wasting time there? You’re on the clock.”
The driver told the supervisor that he needed to defecate. When asked why he didn’t go to the bathroom back at the warehouse, the driver told the supervisor: “I didn’t have to s–t then.”
“Moral of the story, I got sent home for taking a s–t, so Jeff [Bezos], please contact me,” the driver said.
The Post has sought comment from Amazon.
Amazon, the e-commerce retail behemoth whose market capitalization is valued at $1.28 trillion, has been accused of imposing a demanding work culture in which employees are pressured to meet quotas — so much so that they urinate in bottles and defecate in bags while driving.
Last year, company documents leaked to the online news site The Intercept found that Amazon executives were aware that drivers working for the delivery service were flagged for “public urination” and “public defecation” inside vans.
Drivers employed by a delivery contractor hired by Amazon told the site that they were “implicitly forced” to go to the bathroom because they were under intense pressure to meet delivery quotas — or lose their jobs.
“They give us 30 minutes of paid breaks, but you will not finish your work if you take it, no matter how fast you are,” one Amazon driver based in Massachusetts told The Intercept.
Amazon initially denied that its drivers were forced to urinate and defecate in bags, but later acknowledged that the stories were true.
[Written in collaboration with other media outlets with information from the following sources]
