Amazon to create 7,000 jobs in the UK



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Amazon Fulfillment Center (generic)Image copyright
Amazon

Online retail giant Amazon has said it will create another 7,000 UK jobs this year to meet growing demand.

Amazon said it had already added 3,000 positions so far in 2020, so by the end of the year it will have created a total of 10,000 new jobs.

This will bring your total permanent workforce in the UK to over 40,000.

Amazon says the new jobs will be permanent and pay a minimum of £ 9.50 an hour. It is also hiring 20,000 seasonal positions for the holiday period.

The company has faced criticism in the past from unions for the way it treats staff and health and safety.

Changing trends

The coronavirus crisis and lockdowns, which saw many High Street stores temporarily closed, sparked massive growth in online shopping, benefiting online giants like Amazon.

The latest retail sales figures showed that UK online sales in July were more than 50% higher than pre-pandemic levels in February.

Amazon hired thousands of temporary workers during the pandemic, and says many of them will now be able to move into these new permanent roles.

The company is recruiting on more than 50 sites. He said the creation of the new roles, which will include engineers, graduates, human resources, IT, health and safety specialists and finance, as well as the teams that will pick up, pack and ship customer orders, was in response to the growing customer demand. .

“At the center of the job creation program are three new state-of-the-art fulfillment centers in Darlington, Durham and Sutton-in-Ashfield, Nottinghamshire, each equipped with advanced technology from Amazon Robotics and each creating over 1,000 new roles. permanent, “the firm said in a statement.

“Construction of these new distribution centers began last year. Darlington began operations in May and the Durham and Sutton-in-Ashfield sites will launch later this fall.”

Commerce Secretary Alok Sharma said the pandemic had been “a challenging time for many companies” but that the new jobs at Amazon were “enormously encouraging.”

Many businesses, especially High Street retailers, have been cutting jobs in recent months, due to the effects of the coronavirus pandemic and as the government’s job retention scheme begins to decline.

The number of employees on UK payrolls fell by 730,000 between March and July, according to the most recent figures.

However, although many sectors have been hit hard, some companies have been recruiting.

Courier company DPD and B&Q owner Kingfisher said in June they would hire thousands more.

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