An Amazon warehouse employee in Oklahoma turned to the top of the chain - Jeff Bezos himself - after a paycheck issue pushed her to the brink.
Tara Jones was working at an Amazon warehouse back in 2020 when she noticed her paycheck wasn’t adding up.
She was short $90 out of the $540 she was owed while on medical leave. And the problem didn’t just fix itself.
Despite reporting it, Tara kept seeing the same issue pop up.
Eventually, she reached a breaking point and fired off a desperate email straight to the billionaire founder of Amazon.
In her emotional message, which was later seen by the New York Times, Tara wrote: “I’m behind on bills, all because the pay team messed up. I’m crying as I write this email.”
What Tara didn’t know at the time was that her tearful message to Bezos would spark an internal shake-up at one of the most powerful companies in the world.
Tara’s email triggered an investigation that uncovered a much bigger problem. Turns out, she wasn’t alone.
According to the New York Times, workers at a staggering 179 warehouses had been underpaid over a period of 18 months.
Some were forced into serious financial strain - one even had their car repossessed. Others were reportedly fired after a software glitch flagged their legitimate medical leave as absences.
To add to the chaos, doctors’ notes were mysteriously "vanishing" from Amazon’s system.
Amazon has since responded to the mess, insisting that the situation isn’t as widespread as it seemed.
In a statement to The Independent, Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel said: “We’re disappointed when any of our employees experience an issue with their leave.
"The New York Times article suggested these issues are widespread and ongoing. They are not.
"We went back and audited the period in question to make sure employees received their pay, and to our knowledge, there are no outstanding issues.
“The controls we’ve implemented over the last 18 months have resulted in less than 1 percent of people experiencing an issue while being on paid leave.
"Certainly, the unprecedented nature of Covid did put a strain on our system’s ability to keep pace with demand, and we’ve been hard at work investing and inventing to do better every day.”
Amazon, which employed 1,541,000 people globally as of 2023, clearly felt the heat from Tara’s email.
The company’s current CEO, Andy Jassy, who took over from Bezos in July 2021, has pledged to improve the leave system across the board.
Thanks to one frustrated warehouse worker and a bold email to the top, that goal might be a little closer than before.