German union plans Christmas strike at Amazon

Germany's service-sector union Verdi is planning strike action at the online retail giant Amazon over the busy Christmas holiday period, the magazine Focus said on Sunday.

"At one hundred percent, we will go on strike during the season of Advent," Focus quoted Heiner Reimann as saying, Verdi's representative at the Amazon centres in Bad Hersfeld.

The strike will affect this facility in central Germany, as well as the Amazon centre in Leipzig, the magazine said.

The world's biggest online retailer responded with calm and said it was "well prepared" for such action, Focus reported.

Verdi has been trying for months to get Amazon to bring the pay of its 9,000 workers in Germany in line with wages in the distribution sector.

Amazon refuses, arguing that its distribution centres are logistic sites and that it pays its staff accordingly. Wages in the logistics sector in Germany are lower than those in distribution.

Employees staged a number of walkouts already in May, June and September.

Amazon's German headquarters are in Munich but it also operates eight logistics centres and two customer service centres.

Some 3,300 people work at two locations in Bad Hersfeld and 2,000 in Leipzig in the east of Germany.