“They don’t pay us for all our work”

On weekends you can see him dragging a blue car loaded with 100 kilos of advertising in your residential area. On Saturday he worked 15 hours straight. He didn’t even pause for lunch. Now he’s standing by the sink, serving instant coffee and cookies.

“Ali”, which is actually called something else, is torn between wanting to count and wanting to keep the only job she has. On the condition of being anonymous, he sits down at the kitchen table and sighs deeply. He has worked as a Swedish Direct Advertising (SDR) distributor for a long time, but still yearns to return to his previous jobs. He enjoyed cleaning restaurants much more.

– They paid me there for the time I worked. In all the places I have worked before, companies have followed the rules. But that’s not the case with Swedish direct mail, says Ali.

On paper, he works part time. That’s why they pay you. But in practice, Ali says, he works full time.

– The time I spend packing and unpacking the advertising in the warehouse and taking the batteries to different places before starting the dividend does not count as working time. And neither does the subsequent cleaning, he explains.

It happens that Ali loses a mailbox when he delivers it, and that the resident calls and complains that he has not received his ad.

– So I can, in my unpaid free time, go out to the warehouse and pick up the flyer and then take it on my own and leave the ad at the address I missed.

Your only fixed income

Ali is not alone.

Elsewhere in southern Sweden, Bertil is loading the weekend ad in his garage. You have been advertising SDR for over 15 years and are beginning to approach retirement age. This is your only fixed income.

-Although it is not a large monthly salary, it is a security to have a job that runs all year round so that you will probably earn some money every month, says “Bertil” who does not want his name in the newspaper.

You just want to get paid for all the hours you work.

– I have done some time with accounts with myself and in about one I would have needed almost 50 percent more salary to reach the minimum wage for the time it takes to do the job, says Bertil.

He has worked for many years with the same round and has still never reached the pace that SDR calculates as reasonable for the distance.

It just takes longer to get the job done than SDR claims it does; it’s a constant experience with everyone I talk to, no matter what lane they drive on or what districts they tow their carts in.

To fold and rank the ad before distributing it, you get around 40-50 kroner per hour. Before estimating. Both Ali and Bertil tell it. According to SDR, a person with normal performance should be able to sort 3,200 copies per hour.

– It’s not possible. Not even for someone like me, who has worked for 15 years, says Bertil.

From youth jobs to immigrant jobs

Swedish direct mail promotes itself as one of the “largest employers of young people in Sweden”. On their website you can read that “most are between 13 and 18 years old” and that “most of the people distribute ads to earn extra money”.

The dealers I speak with paint a completely different picture.

Almost all of the people Ali works with are immigrants from Africa. In principle, everyone he has met in the industry has working at SDR as their only source of income.

– Except for a very young Swedish girl, but she only shares publicity in the district where she lives. The rest of us were in many districts and sometimes in other cities as well, says Ali.

At work, no one is openly critical of working conditions. Ali describes something that can almost be compared to a culture of silence.

– In my previous jobs as a cleaner, we have been able to talk to each other about work, but at SDR they don’t talk about something like that because everyone is afraid that someone will tell the boss and that you will. be fired. No one can afford that.

“It is impossible”

The only one who dares to appear with the name and image of the advertising distributors that Kvällsposten comes into contact with is David Nordin from Tjörnarp. The difference between him and the others is that he gets by without the job at SDR. For him, it was not a basic income, but an extra crack that he released very quickly after just one weekend.

– They said that the distance I came would take three hours. I drove for five. And then I also drove faster than is legal, I must admit. And there were two of us at work! My partner and I did it together, he says.

– My father has driven a school taxi and a bus at that distance and it is simply not possible to move in the time they say. It is completely impossible.

Conflict brought to court

Venture capitalist Mikael Ahlström is one of the three largest owners behind SDR. Does not acknowledge criticism.

– If you have many thousands of people going through a company, it is clear that you can always find those who do not think it is good. But never, until now, when he contacted me, did I hear of any misconduct at SDR, he says.

When I contact the CEO of SDR, he refers me to Torbjörn Andersson, responsible for law and environment. Torbjörn says he has never heard of differences as big as those reported by Ali, Bertil and David, and that “nothing would work if we didn’t pay reasonable wages.”

– If someone said it takes 15 minutes longer than expected, then they could have looked to see if, for example, homes have been added, they have to make multiple stops, or if something happened along the way. But that you have to spend almost twice as much time as we calculate sounds very strange. We follow all collective agreements and the time counts we have performed are based on so-called normal performance.

Opinions are divided on what a “normal performance” is. And opinions are so divided that the matter has become a matter for the Labor Court.

On the one hand, there is the employers’ organization Almega, which represents SDR. On the other side of the Swedish Transport Workers’ Union with a group of union-affiliated advertising distributors who are tired of working more than they are paid.

The conflict has been going on for almost three years now. In part, it’s about how many steering wheels a typical performing person has time to fold in an hour.

Just under 2,000, according to the Swedish Transport Workers’ Union. 3200, according to SDR. Torbjörn Andersson says his estimate is based on “hundreds, maybe thousands of measurements.”

So is 3,200 an average?

– No. But this is what we judge the most experienced dealers. It is reasonable if you have a certain amount of training.

So how many people rate advertising to get up to 3,200 copies per hour?

– I have no idea. I think most people do. Or at least they go up at a speed that makes them feel satisfied. Let them feel that they receive reasonable payment for the work they do. I know. Otherwise, they wouldn’t continue to classify.

Jerker Nilsson knows something else. He is the central ombudsman for the Swedish Transport Workers’ Union and 20 years ago, according to his own statement, he sat in Malmö and received many phone calls from angry parents who thought it was unacceptable that their young people only received 25 crowns an hour. . for all the hard work as an ad distributor.

– Today, it is mostly adults from other countries who do the work. And his parents don’t call and complain, says Jerker Nilsson.

One person I spoke to says that he is hired for a part-time salary, but works full-time in practice. Are you surprised?

– No. We want you to get paid for all your work, but that’s not the case today.

The conflict between the union and the employer has been going on for almost three years. A couple of weeks ago, the trial in the Labor Court was canceled for the second time.

Meanwhile, Ali, Bertil and some 6,000 people continue to provide neatly ordered advertising packages to Swedish mailboxes.

Footnote: Ali and Bertil actually have different names.