A Cumbrian author has lifted the lid on what it is like working for Amazon as a delivery driver.
The anonymous writer, who lives in the Eden Valley, has penned Swipe to Finish – which tells the story of the day in the life of a delivery driver and how the mammoth firm treats them.
He has written it under the alias of White Van Man.
Known as delivery associates, he said: “As a self-employed delivery associate over the first lockdown winter, I would regularly get up at 4.15am to drive to Longtown depot and end up collapsing into bed just before midnight.
“Along the way, I had to cope with Cumbria’s icy roads, snowdrifts, dangerous dogs and bodywork-wrecking drystone walls.
“All the time, I was being monitored, both for the speed of his delivery and on his driving.
“Drive too slowly and I would fall behind schedule; drive too fast and I got penalised for poor safety. Either result could stop me and my team from qualifying for a bonus.”
He said he had written the book to tell people about the reality of this sort of drving job.
“Society clearly wants the convenience of home delivery and, for people confined to their houses or in remote areas of the Lakes, Amazon offers a vital lifeline.
“Yet most of us delivery drivers are not employees, so we have neither the statutory protections of employment nor any safety net if we can’t work, for whatever reason.”
Instead of employing drivers directly, Amazon contracts out the management of its delivery associates to delivery service partners.
The partners then contract with the nominally self-employed drivers, and White Van Man says they are given just four days training before being sent out on the road.
White Van Man said there had been some disasters.
He said: “One guy I worked with fell down a flight of stairs while delivering to a top-floor flat. He ended up in hospital and someone else had to come and take all his parcels off him, so the injured driver ended up getting paid nothing at all for that day.
“Nearly every week there would be a written-off van on a transporter in the Amazon car park, where someone had been hit or rolled their vehicle. I ended up stuck in a snowdrift on top of Hartside and nearly totalled my van – thankfully, another driver who lived nearby managed to tow me out.”
The book calls for compassionate leadership and protection for those who currently shoulder all the risk of Amazon’s last-mile deliveries.
He added: “I’m proud of having been an Amazon delivery driver – the other guys were fantastic and would go out of their way to help if I was in trouble.
“It also gave me the opportunity to visit some beautiful places throughout the county, such as houses and gardens that aren’t open to the public.
“But it was also a tiring and stressful experience, not helped by the potential to fall deeply into debt.
“The public should know about how Amazon treats its drivers – their system needs to change, and fast.”
White Van Man first appeared as a column in Private Eye magazine last year.
The independently published Swipe to Finish is available to buy from bookshops and is also listed on Amazon.
