On March 14, dissatisfied partners of the company, who own the points of issue of orders, came to the Moscow office of Wildberries. As it turned out, they are unhappy with the new fines from the marketplace – according to the audience, the company shifts the costs of marriage and replacement of goods onto them. Wildberries drew attention to the fact that publicly expressed dissatisfaction only 0.1% of partners and reproached them for their choice “uncivilized forms of dialogue”. The introduction of fines in the company was called a justified step and explained by the fight against fraud – substitutions when returning goods. Messages soon appeared on social networks about a possible strike of distribution points, but lawyers recommend that entrepreneurs refrain from this step and solve the problem in court. On the evening of March 14 The prosecutor’s office of the Moscow region announced that it was going to check the information about the violation of the labor rights of Wildberries workers.
“We work as slaves”
The scandal around one of the largest Russian marketplaces Wildberries has been gaining momentum since the end of last week, and by March 14 it reached its climax – about 30 owners and managers of pick-up points (POPs) came to the company’s office in Moscow.
The day before, dissatisfied entrepreneurs and employees of the company created a chat in Telegram, which they called Mega Riot. As of the evening of March 14, more than nine thousand participants were registered in it. However, it is impossible to recognize among them the real partners of the company.
Discontent, as it turned out, was caused by changes in the policy of the marketplace. They affected both the points of issue of orders, operating under a franchise, and owned by the company itself. Their essence is as follows: if the buyer returns the goods to the point of issue, and it turns out to be defective, or if at some stage of the return the goods are replaced (it doesn’t matter if the buyer did it, or the pickup point employee), Wildberries imposes a penalty on the owner of the item in the amount of 100% of the value of the goods.
At some pickup points, the accrued sanctions exceeded half a million rubles. At the same time, there is no possibility to challenge the write-off in your personal account, entrepreneurs gathered at the door of the company’s Moscow office told Izvestia.
So, the owner of one of the pickup points, Andrei D., told Izvestia that he had been working with Wildberries for three years. According to him, in all this time, the company has reduced the percentage of sales received by pickup points four times, and recently introduced collective liability for marriage. If the product arrives defective, 20% of its value was written off from the employees. A about a week ago, a 100% hold for supposedly replacing goods began, said Andrew D.
Photo: Izvestiya/Eduard Kornienko
— It overflowed the cup of our patience. After all, people also receive expensive goods, for example, iPhones. You send it back – and you get a deduction of 80 thousand rubles, the businessman said.
Employees have a video for each product, since all the pickup points are “stuffed” with cameras, but no one accepts them, Andrey says.
Kristina Makhinya opened a pick-up point in Moscow just over a year ago.
“We don’t know if we can pay people salaries, the deductions are colossal. We didn’t show off anyway: the percentage of remuneration has dropped to 3%, and the requirements are growing every day,” she shared.
“We don’t work without pay”
Gathered outside the Wildberries office discussed the possibility of stopping work. Similar messages appeared on social media throughout the day.
— We will open tomorrow, but we would like to receive feedback from the company. We want to understand whether we continue to work or not,” explained, for example, Kristina Makhinya.
Photo: Izvestia/Eduard Kornienko
Those gathered at the office were not allowed inside. Then they called the police and handed over 20 statements to law enforcement officials. According to the police, all of them will be considered in due course.
“Large sums are being withheld from us unilaterally, allegedly for the substitution of goods, without the possibility of challenging this. We want to work for money, not for fines.”– says one of the statements (Izvestia has it).
Photo: Izvestia/Eduard Kornienko
On the same evening, at the initiative of Wildberries, a Zoom conference was held, in which about a thousand people took part. According to the entrepreneurs, Elena Timko, a representative of the company, spoke about the changes in the terms of the offer, which were already known. It was announced that the functionality for partners and employees would be developed, but the specifics, according to some participants in the event, were not announced.
Meanwhile, photos appeared on Telegram showing that it was decided to close part of the pickup point in some regions. “Closed. We don’t work without pay! – such announcements hang on the doors of the points, which are allegedly located in Komsomolsk-on-Amur and Barnaul.
“From an elephant fly”
“Information about the closure of distribution points, and even more so about “strike” is not true. The points continue to work in the standard mode,” so what is happening was commented on in Wildberries. The company laid responsibility for the current situation on the “yellow Telegram channels”, which “blew a molehill out of a molehill”.
Photo: TASS/Petr Kovalev
About 10-15 people came to the Moscow office, but this is only 0.1% of the total number of the company’s partners, they added. In addition, since some of those who came did not give their names, the company “does not have confidence that these were really our partners.” Substitution of goods remains an urgent problem, and the imposed sanctions have become a way to protect sellers, Wildberries believe.
— Unfortunately, some unscrupulous buyers or managers [пунктов выдачи] can replace goods – for example, with cheap analogues or unmarked goods. To prevent this from happening, managers must check them when returning goods. Therefore, we have introduced additional protection for our sellers from substitution. We expect that thanks to these measures, the share of fraud will decrease by several times,” the press service of the marketplace said.
Photo: Izvestiya/Eduard Kornienko
The company is in touch with partners, but not with those who “choose uncivilized forms of dialogue, threaten company representatives and attempt to disrupt the work of the office.” With such “cooperation may be suspended for security reasons,” the response says.
Within the law
Wildberries is trying to impose unfavorable contract terms on counterparties, taking advantage of its popularity, Oleg Pavlov, head of the Public Consumer Initiative, believes.
– The sphere of Internet commerce, unlike the retail trade in food products, does not have special regulation on this issue, – said the expert. “This allows the marketplace to pursue such a policy in relation to suppliers and points of issue, while remaining within the law.
Photo: RIA Novosti / Maxim Blinov
However, the methods that the affected entrepreneurs have chosen to protect their rights, according to the organization, are not entirely correct. For example, Art. 428 of the Civil Code (“Accession Agreement”) allows them to judicially change unfavorable or burdensome, in their opinion, conditions and achieve full compensation for damages.
The relationship between the points of issue of Wildberries and the company itself is built on the basis of civil law agreements concluded between them, Nikolay Titov, co-founder of the legal company atLegal, told Izvestia.
Photo: TASS / Alexander Shcherbak
The owners of the points can challenge the new conditions in court, including due to the inability to influence the change in parameters. Claims from multiple pick-up locations may be set out in a class action suit, noticed the lawyer. Whereas defending one’s rights by other methods may result in adverse consequences – for example, a stoppage of work may be followed by fines from the counterparty.
Came in for consideration
The Ministry of Industry and Trade reported that recently the ministry has received several appeals on problematic issues of doing business by the owners of Wildberries order pick-up points.
All of these applications are under consideration. We will also send a request to the marketplace to find out the causes of such problems and possible ways to eliminate them in a short time,” the press service of the department specified. – The agenda of the meeting of the Commission on creating conditions for self-regulation in electronic commerce is being worked out, the event is scheduled to be held in the near future.
Photo: TASS/Petr Kovalev
Meanwhile The prosecutor’s office of the Moscow region is going to check the information about the violation of the labor rights of employees of the Wildberries online store. It will study the procedure for attracting workers, paying them salaries and charging fines. The Prosecutor General’s Office gave such an order to the department, its official Telegram channel reported on March 14.
