A group of Google contractors says they’ve been underpaid by the agency that recruited them, resulting in thousands of dollars in unpaid wages per affected worker. The earliest reports occurred as long ago as 2019, and workers say the payroll errors are happening so regularly that they believe it to be a kind of systematic wage theft.
That system meant that Mylius and his colleagues were officially employed by Artech — even as they were working on Google products as part of teams run by Accenture. But workers say those nesting subcontractor arrangements opened the door for abuse. In theory, Accenture had set the pay rate for each role in a work order document before the hire was made. But many found that the rate on their pay stub was $5 to $10 lower than the specified rate.
Shortly after Artech sent the statement, Mylius received his back pay in full from the company. No explanation was given for the timing of the repayment.Reached for comment, Accenture says it was investigating the claims to ensure all employees were properly paid. “We are committed to ensuring our service providers are paying their people working for Accenture in alignment with our requirements,” Accenture representative Stacey Jones said in a statement. “We are looking into this matter.
“Unless you initiate the investigation and make the case, nothing happens,” Greene says. “No one tells you anything.”
Sadly that’s not unique to google. US contract workers for a certain fruit related company get like $10/hr from an Australian based company, and you know they are billing them for much more than that.