although most quotes are unverified online comments, you can't just discredit them as pure bad gossips about a big corporation, they are from many different people(IP) and some of the witnesses are not doubt very familiar with the factory. i try to translate a few of the comments.
you can just compare the Apple report (
english,
chinese) about foxconn and workers testimony as follows. and
here, 9588 comments (in chinese) about the working conditions in foxconn, and
here (in chinese), more foxconn employees speak out:
foxconn is really vicious, 80% are female workers aged 17-18, some are 15 or 16 years-old, they STAND to work (not allowed to sit), you can image it, standing for 14-15 hours, 20 minutes for lunch. is there any humanity in such a factory? overtime voluntarily? shit! how much base pay they get - 450-580 RMB per month, they have to work overtime to earn as much as 1000 RMB. some work for months without break. there is no media report. local government doesn't care about it, even they know the truth, they won't mind it, how much tax they collect from foxconn, hundreds of millions. the government is certainly very happy with such companies ......
isnt it a fact that some workers work 11-12 hours a day?
i am a foxconn employee, i was greatly delighted when the hidden sinisters of foxconn was exposed. there are so many hidden sinisters in foxconn and let me share a few of them i witnessed with you:
1) Nov 2003. the CCPBG BU is in its slack season and from that month foxconn only pay the 340 RMB base salary, no pay for OT. because of this, a female worker (from Hunan province) went back to her dorm at 23:00 after work and jumped from 3rd floor to kill herself
2) when CCPBG BU was established 2005 and new business dept hired another 10 k employees to produce PSP, the ordinary workers hired from hubei and henan are paid 200 RMB per month (God curse me to death if i lie about this). foxconn said they are only trainees, but actually these "trainees" did the same amount of work as the long standing workers everyday, that is, 12 hours a day......foxconn leased a "dorm" called "dong-yi" to pack 300 workers into one room. you have to get up 5 am to wash and brush, otherwise you will miss the bus and it a 48-minute walk from dorm to the factory. i see many new workers bring their washcloth because they told me that dorm stop supplying water again, they haven't taken bath for three days
3) the labor law of shenzhen set the minimum wage as 580 RMB per month, but foxconn workers' base salary is only 480 RMB per month
4) ....... the OT in foxconn is always FORCED, whenever they received orders, you have to work everyday, otherwise, you are not allowed to come to factory and that day was taken off from your OT. many workers left foxconn because of this unreasonable rule, and the turnover rate in foxconn is very high
foxconn dorm, factory
......let's talk about the operators in the production lines, they paid very poorly and sometimes work 16 hours a day, they work OT every night, if they are lucky enough, they will have half-day break or one night without OT
there is only 20 minutes for lunch, can you believe it- 20 minutes! and there are 1000 m from the workshop to the restaurant and you have to queue, finally you have only 4-5 minutes for your lunch, everybody in foxconn knows that
foxcon is much better than other factories, certainly those on the bottom live miserably life, it's unavoidably that some are oppressed and exploited
note: a long article by a new college graduate who just resigned from foxconn:
foxconn is a fraud!
...... after i arrived in foxconn, the first thing is to sign the employment contract, ... what makes angry is that the contract says during probation period if i was fired by foxconn, i have to pay foxconn for "breaking" the contract ....... let me tell you the working environment, ... you stand for 8 hours a day to work and you have to stand straight, otherwise you will be punished to stand by the wall like a soldier ...... even you have nothing to do you must stand there!!! only after you experience that, you can understand how unbearable that is. when we come off work, all of us can not control our feet, and in evenings, there are two-hour training courses waiting for you ......no saturady, you have only one day off in one week ... the so-called OT pay doesn't exist, you have to apply for it and chances are that 90% of them don't get approved.
most operation workers rely on OT pay, most of them 17-18 young kids
indeed, i have worked in foxconn for one month and, UNBEARABLE, you get up 6 am to jog and come off work 10 pm. in 1997 foxconn hired 200 workers from hunan job market and the next day 180 workers left there, foxconn like to hire new graduates, they have no social experience, quite obedient and keep silence when bullied