Amazon agrees to pay Italy 180 million euros to resolve tax, labour investigations

Amazon has agreed to pay compensation for approximately 180 million euros and abandoned a monitoring system for delivery staff, ending an investigation into alleged tax fraud and illegal labour practices on Friday.

As reported by Reuters, the group’s logistics services unit was primarily accused of bypassing labour and tax laws, relying on cooperatives that supplied it with workers, avoiding VAT tax and reducing social security payments.

The group has now reportedly paid around 180 million euros (US$209.83 million) to the Italian tax agency as part of a 1-billion-euro settlement involving 33 companies that have been subjected to similar probes in Milan.

According to reports, these include Italian units of DHL, FedEx and Ups, and Italian supermarket chain Esselunga.

The deal demonstrated that companies under investigation also agreed to comply with the current deal by employing more than 50,000 workers who were previously employed indirectly through the cooperatives.

The current revelation elucidated that as part of the wider settlement with other logistics companies, Amazon had specifically agreed to employ thousands of workers directly.

Nonetheless, the payment was an exhaustive resolution to put an end to legal exposure related to labour law compliance in Italy.