Takealot feels the heat over safety issues and undocumented foreigners

Retail giant Takealot is in hot water with the Department of Employment and Labour over health and safety issues and for hiring undocumented foreign nationals.

The department said it had issued three notices for non-compliance of Occupational Health and Safety regulations to Takealot at its Kempton Park warehouse.

It was conducting physical and administration inspections at the company and also engagements with the company’s onsite employees.   

Compliance deadline

The department has granted Takealot 60 days from the date of served notice to get its house in order.

“The Department of Employment and Labour’s Inspection and Enforcement Services (IES) inspectors have discovered that it has not been complying with the Occupational Health and Safety Act 85 of 1993, at its warehouse in Gauteng, Kempton Park, where parts of the facility pose an immediate danger to its workers on-site.”

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Better facilities

Takealot’s online retail management was also served with a notice to improve the company’s clinic facilities, create demarcated driveways inside the warehouse and improve the company’s warehouse risk assessment specification.

The online retailer was issued with three prohibition notices that prevented them from:

• allowing contractors on-site with step-ladders without non-skid rubber
• storing of chemicals in a general storing area or racks in that they are flammable and can have an adverse effect on the health and safety of employees
• deducting monies from employees for the provision of protective safety shoes

Inspection

The mega blitz inspection was spearheaded by the Department of Employment and Labour’s Inspector-General, Aggy Moiloa, who told Takealot management that the department is willing to assist them to comply with the labour laws.

“We don’t take pleasure in seeing you being squeamish. We don’t want that because we hardly ever subscribe to the stick approach, unless we are pushed to the limits and if you push us you are going to see that,” Moila said.

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