Amazon seeks 13,000 staff for festive season

Amazon wants warehouse and customer service centre staff. Picture: Getty

The announcement, which will see roles created at sites including its Dunfermline, Edinburgh and Gourock bases, comes just a week after the online retailer said it was looking for 1,000 permanent staff across the UK to meet growing demand.

It was one of a series of positive job announcements yesterday. BT said it was creating 500 engineering jobs at its Openreach arm, including 103 in Scotland, and Yodel said it was seeking seasonal staff.

John Tagawa, director of UK operations at Amazon – which received more than four million orders on its busiest day last Christmas season – said: “The thousands of seasonal associates who join us at this time of year play an integral role in helping us deliver an exceptional experience for our customers.”

He said hundreds of the temporary posts will lead to permanent, full-time positions with the company.

The BT jobs are being created in Ayr, Dumfries, Glasgow, Motherwell and Paisley and brings the total number of new recruits announced by Openreach across the UK this year to around 2,400, including more than 300 modern apprentices.

Andy Kerr, deputy general secretary of the Communication Workers Union, said: “We especially welcome the opportunities given to women to become engineers and to 300 young people.”

Meanwhile, parcel carrier Yodel is creating 5,000 full- and part-time jobs in preparation for the busy Christmas period.

The posts include warehouse staff, drivers and self-employed van drivers and couriers, plus managers and administration staff. Yodel said it expects to handle up to a million parcels a day over the festive period.

Royal Mail has already said it would take on 19,000 extra workers, including 1,100 in Scotland, between mid-November and early January. Last year it delivered more than ten million parcels a day in the run-up to Christmas.