The California Supreme Court has ruled that Apple must pay retail store staff for the time they spend waiting for their personal bags to be checked at the end of their shifts. Pending the outcome of resulting class action cases, Apple would have to pay millions of dollars to their roughly 12,000 retail employees, who fall under the mandatory search policy.
The employees are required to clock out before their exit search which may take some time. Those who refused to go for search even have to face disciplinary action or even termination from the company… In its order, the state’s high court had rejected Apple’s stand that employees could avoid searches by not bringing any iPhone or bag to office work.
This case is the third the state high court heard in relation to minimum wages and time. A couple of years back the court had asked Starbucks to pay for off-the-clock work, like going through a checklist in order to close the store — that can take some time minutes more than somebody’s shift.
MacDailyNews Take: Is this some leftover policy from John Browett’s short shift as head of Apple Retail? We ask because this seems like a policy some discounter would implement, not the world’s most valuable company which literally has so much money coming in that they don’t know what to do with it.
If you are requiring employees to do something, regardless of what it is; mundane or revolutionary, then you should pay them for their time. This seems like basic logic.
Paying employees for time spent in bag checks seems like something Apple should have realized and done from the outset. Not only is it wrongheaded PR (the world’s richest company asking retail employees to donate their time daily for bag checks, seriously?), it’s just immoral, not to mention illogical. It’s a cheapskate mentality in the most expensive and profitable retail spaces in existence. Yet, Apple is fighting it in court? Come on!
Let’s get real, Apple brass: Stop being cheap, end the appeals, settle, apologize, and pay up. Then figure out how to smooth the current bag check process so it costs your employees less time and, therefore, the company less money. You know: innovate.
Again, we understand the need for bag checks. Apple should keep requiring bag checks for retail employees. The company simply needs to fairly pay their employees for the time spent during the mandatory activity.