Subscribe
Amazon warehouse workers are using bots to automatically and instantly claim precious time off slots before their coworkers, according to multiple Reddit posts by Amazon workers and Github pages for two of these bots viewed by 404 Media.
The Amazon workers are trying to claim voluntary time off, or VTO. VTO is separate from Amazon’s other version of time off of work, known as unpaid time or UPT, which is what makes it so valuable. Workers have a set amount of UPT, which they can use at their own discretion—but once it runs out, they can be disciplined or even lose their jobs. UPT is precious to workers, and VTO does not deduct from UPT reserves.
“VTO is valuable because unlike UPT, we actually accumulate towards getting more UPT as opposed to using UPT and wasting it,” said one worker at a sortation warehouse in California, who asked to remain anonymous to prevent potential corporate backlash.
When VTO is available, it is generally posted in the evening on an Amazon app used by workers to track their shifts, and the app sends a notification about the availability of VTO some moments later. The workers making the posts say, however, that by the time they’ve gotten the notification, the available VTO is gone.