Amazon Worker Emails Jeff Bezos About Missing Pay — And Triggers A Company-Wide Audit

An Amazon warehouse worker said a payroll error left her “behind on bills” and “crying,” so she emailed Jeff Bezos. What happened next went far beyond her own case.

An Amazon employee decided to skip the usual channels and write directly to Jeff Bezos about a pay problem. She did not expect her message to set off a broader review across the company.

At 61, Bezos ranks among the world’s wealthiest people, having grown Amazon from a garage startup into one of the most valuable companies on the planet.

A year before he handed the CEO role to Andy Jassy in July 2021, Bezos received an email from Tara Jones, a warehouse associate based in Oklahoma, laying out her payroll issue.

Jones was out on medical leave and expected a paycheck of $540. When it arrived, a significant portion was missing.

She told company officials that $90 had not been paid.

When the same problem happened again, she took matters into her own hands and emailed the CEO directly.

An Amazon employee messaged Jeff Bezos after she suffered an issue with her payGetty Stock Image

According to reporting from The New York Times, Jones wrote: “I’m behind on bills, all because the pay team messed up. I’m crying as I write this email.”

Before long, it became clear she wasn’t the only worker affected.

Her note prompted a company audit that, per the outlet, identified 179 other warehouse employees who had been underpaid over roughly 18 months.

One worker said they lost their car to repossession. Others said they were terminated after medical leave was logged as unexcused absences.

Meanwhile, employees reported that doctors’ notes were disappearing in the system, which added to the confusion around approved leave.

Responding to questions from the press, Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel told The Independent: “We’re disappointed when any of our employees experience an issue with their leave.”

“The New York Times article suggested these issues are widespread and ongoing. They are not.”

“We went back and audited the period in question to make sure employees received their pay, and to our knowledge, there are no outstanding issues.”

Some Amazon workers complained they’d been struck off and had their cars repossessed because of the issueGetty Stock Image

“The controls we’ve implemented over the last 18 months have resulted in less than one percent of people experiencing an issue while being on paid leave.”

“Certainly, the unprecedented nature of COVID did put a strain on our system’s ability to keep pace with demand and we’ve been hard at work investing and inventing to do better every day.”

Jones’s story is not unique. Others have written to Bezos and received quick responses routed through Amazon’s executive customer relations team.

In one case shared on Reddit’s LegalAdviceUK forum, a customer said a “high value item” priced at $1,480 (listed at £1,099.97) was marked delivered even though it never arrived. The order required a one-time password, which added to their frustration.

They emailed Bezos. Soon after, an executive relations agent reached out, offered a full refund, and provided a goodwill gift card.

The customer said going straight to the top made the difference.

Reaching out to leadership isn’t a fix-all, but in these cases it forced a closer look — and in Jones’s case, it led to back pay for many others, too.