Amazon to employees: we will pay you to stop and carry parcels

NEW YORK – Amazon, who strives to deliver packages faster, turns to its employees with a proposal: quit your job and we'll help you start a business providing Amazon packages.

The offer, announced Monday, comes as Amazon seeks to shorten the shipping time from two days to one for its members Premium. The company sees this new measure as a way to get more packages faster to customers.

Amazon says that this will cover up to $ 10,000 in start-up costs for employees who will be accepted into the program and quit their jobs. The company says it will also pay them three months of their salary. The offer is open to most Amazon part-time and full-time employees, including warehouse workers who prepare and ship orders. Whole Foods employees are not eligible to receive the new incentives.

Seattle-based company Amazon.com Inc. declined to say how many employees it would expect.

The incentive for new employees is part of a program launched by Amazon a year ago that allows anyone to request the launch of an independent Amazon delivery company. The company's plan is to control more of its own deliveries, rather than relying on UPS, the mail and other carriers. Start-up costs start at $ 10,000 and participating entrepreneurs can rent blue vans with the Amazon smile logo stamped on the side.

Comment this story

In total, more than 200 Amazon distribution companies have been created since the launch of the program last June, said John Felton, vice president of global distribution services for Amazon.

One of them is headed by Milton Collier, a freight broker who started his business in Atlanta about eight months ago. Since then, the company has 120 employees and has a fleet of 50 vans that can handle up to 200 delivery stops a day. He 's already prepared for the passage of a day to the expeditions by hiring more people.

"We are ready," says Collier.