996: Secret and public "pain"

Investigation of abnormal overtime work culture on Internet platform

　　Reporters Zhou Lin, Wang Moling

　　"996", a word that frequently appears in social network Tucao, but almost never appears in the company's "clear text system".

　　In the past few days, the sudden deaths, jumps, and dismissals of employees in Pinduoduo have once again triggered public condemnation and attention.

　　On the 12th, a reporter from Xinhua Daily Telecom contacted the dismissed employee and reviewed the incident.

And behind the "996", which has been publicly implemented, and at the same time secretive and secretive, the abnormal overtime culture reflected in it is worth pondering.

　Agree that the remarks are excessive but do not regret posting the video

　　On December 29, 2020, a female employee in her early 20s passed away unexpectedly; on January 9, 2021, an employee was reported to commit suicide by jumping from a building in Changsha... A series of incidents caused Pinduoduo to "deformed overtime" and "996" work The mechanism was pushed to the front again.

　　The incident has repeatedly fermented.

On January 10, 2021, a Pinduoduo employee named "Wang Taixu" posted a video "I was fired by Pinduoduo because I saw my colleague being carried into an ambulance" on multiple online platforms.

　　On the 11th, Pinduoduo responded to reporters that the company found that the content of its previous anonymous posts was full of bad "extreme remarks", such as: "I want to die", "Put the ashes of XX" and so on.

The human resources department judged that the above remarks of the employee seriously violated the employee handbook, and his extreme emotions may cause unknowable threats to other colleagues, and decided to terminate the labor contract with him.

　　The response also stated that after the company terminated the labor contract with him, the employee and his surroundings continued to post false statements online, including the company HR learned that he posted in an anonymous community by looking at his mobile phone, and the company HR threatened to destroy its files. The company has a "duty calculator" for 300 hours of work, and the above are all rumors.

　　"I admit that my remarks are a bit extreme, but I don't regret posting the video on the Internet." On the 12th, in an exclusive interview with a reporter from Xinhua Daily Telegraph, Wang Taixu showed the reporter a record of another colleague, this colleague for the whole month All keep clocking in from Sunday, Monday to Friday, every Saturday, from around 10 am to around 10 pm.

　　"Since joining Pinduoduo for one and a half years, I have almost always been at work at 11 in the morning, leaving at 11 in the evening, and working 6 days a week. The monthly working hours are around 300 hours. This is also the current situation of many colleagues in the group. If working hours If you don’t meet the requirements, you will be talked to by your supervisor. But these will not be clearly stipulated in'white and black', but an implicit system, which is difficult to prove."

　　Currently, Wang Taixu is already consulting labor arbitration and other related matters.

"My mood is very complicated, with anger, helplessness, and regret. The anger is that the company's overtime system is constantly breaking through the bottom line; the frustration is that the salary brought by the overtime culture is indeed slightly higher. Everyone must be due to their own personal planning and life pressure. Stay; it is a pity that there are thousands of'I' left in this system." Wang Taixu said.

　Hidden overtime work as a "standard" but it is difficult to prove

　　The condemnation of mechanisms such as "996" is not an isolated case. Controversies caused by the malformed overtime culture have frequently appeared in recent years: some claim that "996 is a kind of blessing"; some openly stated at the company's annual meeting that "the future implementation of 996 work Even if the work-family balance is not good, a divorce can be taken as an example.” Some companies have announced that all employees will start the “double rest every other week” mode.

　　On social platforms, there are many young people who complain about "996" while working overtime.

　　"The big Internet companies never explicitly say that they work overtime, but the'benefits' of free shuttle buses, free meal coupons, and free taxis are a step-by-step'routine' for employees to work overtime'voluntarily'." Xiao Zhang, an Internet company employee, introduced. "You can get on the free shuttle bus if you walk two hours late, and you can get a free meal coupon for the next day if you work overtime for an hour, and you can be reimbursed for taxi fare after another hour. Therefore, almost no one does not work overtime. , And it even seems that we are'willing' to work overtime." Xiao Zhang said that he had hardly seen anyone in his group leave work on time. "Walking on time actually feels like skipping work."

　　Difficulty in proof and certification is one of the important reasons for the prevalence of overtime work.

From the perspective of supervision and law enforcement agencies, it is often easy to fall into a situation where only workers can report in order to be passively supervised; and in order to keep their jobs, workers who are willing to stand up against the company and have sufficient resistance are extremely small.

　　"According to the maximum working hours of the labor law, the '996' working system is obviously overtime, and even the length of time exceeded is quite alarming." Li Leyuan, a senior partner at Beijing Yingke (Shanghai) Law Firm, believes that regardless of the length of overtime, employers will It is necessary to negotiate with workers to extend working hours, but this "negotiation" is often superficial or even "absent" in practice.

"From the fact that I joined the company for a year and a half, I haven't been in contact with the company's labor union." Wang Taixu said.

　　The lack of the system also makes it difficult to identify "death from overwork".

The Work Injury Insurance Regulations passed in 2003 stipulate seven situations that can be identified as work-related injuries, but do not include "death from overwork."

"Strictly speaking,'death from overwork' is not a legal concept. According to the current regulations, it is possible to identify'death from overwork' as a work-related injury when a sudden illness occurs at work or during working hours and rescues within 48 hours. Invalid circumstances.” Jiang Kai, an assistant researcher at the Institute of Law of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, said that the identification standards are relatively strict.

　Say goodbye to "the glory of overtime"

　　Experts believe that workers should enhance their own legal awareness and have stronger awareness of evidence and preservation.

　　The reporter found that in a case in 2018, there was a case where an employee died suddenly after working overtime for a month and a half, and his family took the company to court.

Cases show that first, if working hours and extended working hours exceed the upper limit prescribed by law, the company’s reasons for “voluntary overtime” and “paid overtime” cannot be used as reasonable reasons for illegally extending working hours; second, even if it is not possible It proves that overtime and the result of death have inevitable direct cause and effect, and cannot be identified as a work injury. The company shall also be liable for compensation for the loss caused by the death of the employee.

　　At the moment when the vacation culture is bigger than the overtime culture, it is difficult to expect enterprises to solve the dilemma of overtime work through moral consciousness.

As early as many years ago, experts called for: to curb excessive overtime, establish and improve working hours consultation mechanism at the enterprise level, scientifically formulate labor quotas at the industry level, clearly define the "death from overwork" standard at the legislative level, and increase it at the government level Strengthen law enforcement and punishment, and earnestly safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of workers.

　　In view of the difficulty of identifying "death from overwork" as a work-related injury, many experts also suggest that the scope of the occupational disease catalog should be appropriately expanded, and "some diseases that are commonly caused by work pressure but not included in the original catalog should be included." Jiang Kai said. It is necessary to use the improvement of legal standards to make enterprises realize that abnormal "overtime work" is not glorious or even costly, but also to allow organizational forces such as industry associations and enterprise unions to play a role to protect the rights and interests of workers.

　　Li Leyuan said that under the wave of technological development, many workers are helplessly trapped in it. While precise calculations bring extremely high efficiency, don't forget the safety issues behind them.

"Industry inertia is not necessarily reasonable. It is only about taking good care of every worker, so that our society can create greater value."