Amazon uses AI to monitor union risk in UK warehouses

Internal documents made public as part of a court battle between Amazon and a Canadian union suggest the company uses Atlas, an in-house forecasting tool. The tool gives each warehouse a score between 100 and 900 using hundreds of inputs, including Reddit posts and answers to internal feedback surveys. The lower the score, the more likely Atlas believes workers in that warehouse are to unionise. The document suggests this scale can be used to inform staffing decisions, resource planning, standard actions, and ownership to mitigate risks. Amazon says the activity is site or building level only. The documents surfaced in a dispute before the Canadian labour system. The British Columbia Labour Board found Amazon had violated multiple local labour laws in the dispute. Most of the material concerns North American sites, but two warehouse sites, BHX4 in Coventry and EMA4 in Minworth, are included in Amazon's list of Tier 1 sites and described as "risky". The GMB union is asking Amazon whether Atlas or any equivalent system is in use at British sites. A UK government spokesperson said employers and workers share an interest in monitoring technologies being used transparently and in ways that are fair, accountable and reliable. For teams building workforce analytics, this case shows how a scoring model can become a legal liability once its target is collective action. Scoring staff from public forums and survey responses raises questions about data protection and employment rights, and lawyers are already asking which inputs feed each score. Builders should document data sources, keep protected activity out of model features, and be ready to explain how an output was reached.