My Story

This is a long story, be patient, read it all and appreciate the fact that you don't work for Amazon and if you do, I pity you.
I have to start a bit ahead of my employment with Amazon, because what led up to being hired is just as important to the story as the story itself.
As I said, it's a long one, so please read it all, so you can understand what's happened.




Basically it started back in California, my wife had been talking to her father on the phone for quite a long while.  They hadn't seen each other in many years and he was, sadly enough, dying from COPD, liver failure and other problems.  He had suggested several times that we move to Florida, so that my wife, who is disabled, could take care of him and we'd "have somewhere to live and never really have to worry about it again."

It sounded like a fairly good idea, especially after we had gone through some rough times with her mother.  We had taken her in, at least three times, because of her issues with an abusive husband and step-daughter.  The woman was a narcissist, a control-freak and had some mental issues; she had screwed us over those three times and I promised "never again."  Well, usually I am very skeptical, cynical and cautious when I have to deal with people I can't trust, but I set things aside and we took her in.  To cut things short here: all we got was pain, lies and trouble from her the whole time she was with us.  Health wise, she refused to take her meds, which made her worse and eventually she passed away.

When my wife's father suggested we move cross-country, so my wife could be his caregiver, we discussed it a lot, not wanting to make a wrong decision, like we had with her mother.  He insisted that if we moved, when he passed, my wife would inherit the mobile home he owned and we'd never have to worry about a place to live.  He made the whole move-in thing sound pretty good, since we had our own worries about where to live.

We put about 90% of our belongings in storage; all of our family heirlooms, book collections, record collections and family photographs...this also included a large collection of letters my father wrote to my mother, during World War II.  We figured once we moved to Florida, we'd send for our stuff, however even well laid plans can and often go fuck up.

Cutting things shorter---we hadn't realized that her father was as bad as he was, we also didn't know that part of the living arrangements meant we would have to basically financially support him as well.  Even though he had an income, his demands for "room and board +" was ludicrous as best, however what options did we have?

We continued to have problems paying for the storage way back in California, it was hard to keep up the payments when the old man was taking a majority of my wife's limited disability checks.

When he passed away in May 2016, things began to go totally awry.  There had been some gossip about the mobile home park's owner, Dave Marger, who had made it plain to the manager, that he wanted the "pad" back, where the mobile home was sitting.  The old man might have owned the home but he rented the pad.  Marger had been noted to being cruel about taking over people's homes, but the old man didn't believe any of the stories.

The old man left no will, no other legal papers, other than insurance, so we started to have a bad go at it soon after his death.  The third day after his death, sometime around 9pm, in the pouring rain, one of the manager's flunkies left a note on our door, telling us we had to move.  What kind of heartless asshole is going to do that?

My wife tried to call Mr Marger but he refused to talk to her, so she called his attorney, who was totally impolite; he insisted that we "move immediately or face eviction," regardless of the fact that the home was now my wife's, as I said, the pad was rented, so naturally, they can and do evict people "off the pad."  He cared less that the move would make us homeless, and when my wife told him that she was afraid that the stories about his owner, Dave Marger, were true and she didn't want them to "steal" the mobile home, he sarcastically told her that they wouldn't steal it (which they eventually did anyway). He simply said: "I don't care where you go, just get the fuck out of the house, sell it or rent it, I don't give a damn."

It was soon after this that I was hired at Amazon, I thought it was a blessing at the time, being fifty-nine and getting employed, full time.  We used my first check to move into an apartment, however as not promised by the heartless attorney, they did steal her inheritance.  

It took us from July to December to get ourselves on some kind of level footing, it had been really rough, in the meantime, we lost our belongings, back in California. It was totally sad, we had lost everything and some of the stuff, I'd been able to keep since childhood---now it was all gone.

Things went fairly ok for us, it was hard work at Amazon for sure, most people have no idea what goes on in a fulfillment center and believe it's all wonderful, which in fact it isn't.  Working conditions totally suck, it's all rush rush rush.  When I first got my job, they swore there were "no packing quotas" which turned out ot be a sort of lie. They weren't officially called quotas, more like "goals."  

I mad it through "Peak" but was disapointed with management when I was pushed aside by a manager, when I wanted to try a different position in AFE, then I was insulted whem Assistant Manager Tim said: "You have reached your potential..." so I transfered out to what is called Pack Singles.

It coninued to be so rush rush, and only a small percentage of packers can reach their quota, yet everything is based on them, on how much to pack at any given shift.  I was, sad to say, consistantly behind by around six to eight boxes, which shouldn't be such a big deal, but Amazon makes it a big deal.

In mid-April 2016, I suffered an on-job injury, I did as I was supposed to do, I reported it to my manager and then went downstairs to what they call Amcare, a bunch of folks who're "EMT wanna-be" sorts.  All they wanted to do was put BioFreeze on it and send me right back to what I was doing, that hurt me in the first place.  I decided to opt for Worker's Comp, thinking I'd get something done right.  This decision would prove to be my downfall.

The doctor they sent me to was rather bogus from the get-go.  I had tried to explain to her about where it hurt and all she was concerned with was the shoulder muscles. Forget the fact that my spine between my shoulder-blades was hurting like hell.  Every time I tried to tell her about it, she ignored it and changed the subject.  She put me on light duty, which is a joke, there is no light duty at Amazon.

I worked this light duty for a while, even signed the "acommodations" agreeing that the light duty was good enough and I would be ok.  However the pain in my spine grew worse and yet I continued to work.  I had one last appointment with the WC doctor; again she totally ignored me when it came to my spine, and insisted that I concentrate on the shouder muslces.  She wanted me to do physical therapy, I told her, again, that the pain in the spine was quite unbearable and all I got was "well I noticed you have bad posture, if you do something about your posture, then it won't hurt."  What kind of bogus bullshit is that?

She added to the light duty regulations and I went back to work.  I lasted for another two days, on a Saturday morning, I got home around 5:30am, totally exhausted and in extreme spine pain.  There was no way I was going to be able to keep this up, without some help with the spine.  I called the Amazon employee help line and asked what I should do, I couldn't work that upcoming night and had used all of my "unpaid time," (Amazon gives its employees a total of 20 hours of unpaid time off, every three months and a limited amount of paid time off---if you use up all of your unpaid time off, you can be fired, or as Amazon calls it, "separated").

All I got was, "tell HR..." and that was that.  I had written, about a week or so prior, to Stephen Bordes, the Amazon WC rep, about my situation, he was on vaction, so I didn't hear from him for a while.  I wanted to know if I would be fired, having missed my final amount of unpaid time, even though I was on Worker's Comp.  Eventually I got an answer from somebody in HR.

No, I didn't qualify for FMLA since I hadn't been there quite a year yet and I didn't qualify for Amazon Leave either.  This was their story for several weeks, as an option for me, until finally being threatened with being fired.  I called the Amazon Leave Team and put in a claim, I was told to see a doctor, get the necessary papers filled out and that within a week, I'd start to get paid 60% of my usual pay.  I was also told that the necessary papers would arrive within a week, to be filled out by me and then some, to be filled out by my doctor.

That was, as I found out, a partial lie.

Instead of waiting for me to go see the doctor before they sent her the papers by fax, even before I was able to make an appointment to see her, I got a call, I was told the "doctor doesn't do that..." the medial leave thing.  Bullshit.  So I tried to call Amazon Leave Team but it took a couple of days to get a response.  I finally got them and tol them what's up and that I'd have to find another doctor and then asked about my medical insurance.  I was assured I was still covered and that "things wil be fine..." yet when I contacted a doctor, I was told I had to "pay the deductable..." which I'd not have had to do prior to going off on medical leave.  I had no money, I couldn't do that.  So once again I tried to call A Leave Team, with no help.

In the meantime, I contacted Amazon's Worker's Comp people and told them about their doctor and the problems I was having.  Well, I tried to contact them, it took a bit to finally get hold of the worker.  She said she'd find another doctor, but that took a while too.

As it all is summed up:  I haven't been paid since the following Friday after Memorial day, I was promised 60% of my pay, I guess it was a lie, I was promised a new WC doctor, but way too late for that one.  I never could get another doctor for the leave thing, because I had to pay a deductible I couldn't pay.  

So, that brings us up to this point: Amazon has made us homeless. Well, ok, almost, maybe in a week or so.

We got late on the car payment, paid that one and now are late once again because we only have my disabled wife's disability...the promised 60% never happened.

I contacted an attorney, however he doesn't sound all that thrilled with his job, and I wasn't even able to convey to him, this story, he just seemed uninterested.  However, I still want to keep the thing active.

How odd, that about three or more weeks after I initially applied for leave, the papers finally  arrived, I signed and sent them off, yet I don't know what goes on next.  It's been a month etc, since I last got paid, the (redundantly said) promised pay never was paid, if it had been, we'd be in a better situation and not gonna be homeless soon.

We decided we wanted to move back to California, yet we haven't been able to save up any funds for that at all.  Going homeless is the biggest shadow in front of us, losing the car, at this point would be devastating.

Amazon totally fucked me over, they did what they did on purpose.  They stretched out whole thing so I couldn't apply for unemployment, they lied to me, telling me all I had to do was this and that and I'd get my 60% of pay.  Instead, they dragged it all out, from the Worker's Comp people, to Amazon itself...so that I wouldn't be able to file for unemployment.

Amazon is a horrible company, they mistreat their employees and sad to say, most of them never even know it, most of them are simply blind to the unjust things until it happens to them.  

Amazon has put us on the street, the company is rife with bullshit and lies to its employees who run afoul of the unpaid time off, or even Worker's Comp.  

Amazon isn't the lovely, wonderful world of commerce that they love to portray to the buying public.  They have a huge facade around them, which they feel is protection against the truth...but we, who have run afoul of Amazon and been mistreated, we know the truth about them, its a shame nobody cares enough to pay attention.

Amazon has made my disabled wife and I homeless and nobody cares.
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