'We're getting flat out hammered right now.' UPS employees on working during the pandemic
At UPS, the most frantic time of year is typically around the winter holidays. Then things level off. But these days, as the coronavirus pandemic spurs American households and businesses to buy almost everything online, the deliveries have seemed relentless.
Online sales data and anecdotal evidence from employees we spoke to show the volume of packages handled has significantly increased. That has many UPS workers putting in long, physically exhausting hours while, at the same time, taking extra precautions to protect themselves from infection.
"I'm working more than I ever have in almost 24 years at UPS," Jack Warren, a UPS delivery driver based out of Providence, Rhode Island, tells CNN. Warren is also a union steward and is in charge of the safety committee at his facility. He says the team spends extra time cleaning "handrails, doorknobs, some of the machinery," including the trucks and forklifts. Drivers, who walk into dozens of public spaces a day, also carry paper towels and cleaning spray, he said.
At UPS's massive Worldport facility in Louisville, Kentucky, which processes roughly 2 million packages a day, two employees have died from Covid-19, according to Teamsters Local 89, which represents workers at Worldport, and a Clarke County, Indiana health official. It's unclear where the workers contracted the virus, the company said. "COVID-19 is a community-spread virus. There is no way to know how/where someone contracted it," wrote UPS spokesman Jim Mayer in an email to CNN.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/were-getting-flat-out-hammered-right-now-ups-employees-on-working-during-the-pandemic/ar-BB133kBS?li=BBnbfcN
= new reply since forum marked as read
