Google has reportedly been knowingly underpaying workers in Europe and Asia for years.
The Guardian reported that Google executives “have been aware since at least May 2019 that the company was failing to comply with local laws in the UK, Europe and Asia that mandate temporary workers be paid equal rates to full-time employees performing similar work.”
An internal memo from February 2021 showed that Google paid temporary workers in the EMEA and APAC regions 12% to 50% less than it was supposed to, according to the report, and another document showed UK workers’ hourly wages should’ve been up to 28% higher as well.
Google was reportedly slow to resolve the problem because of “concern about the increased cost to departments that rely heavily on temporary workers, potential exposure to legal claims, and fear of negative press attention.” It turns out all three of those fears were justified.
The Guardian said that a whistleblower has filed a complaint with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission alleging that Google violated U.S. securities laws by omitting the liability incurred by underpaying these temporary workers from its quarterly financial reports.
Google chief compliance officer Spyro Karetsos told The Guardian that the comparator rates cited in the report don’t reflect the actual pay rates of individual contractors and that “most temporary staff are paid significantly more than the comparator rates.”
“Nevertheless, it’s clear that this process has not been handled consistent with the high standards to which we hold ourselves as a company,” Karetsos said. “We’re doing a thorough review, and we’re committed to identifying and addressing any pay discrepancies that the team has not already addressed. […] And we’ll be conducting a review of our compliance practices in this area. In short, we’re going to figure out what went wrong here, why it happened, and we’re going to make it right.”
The company didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
