McDonald's Russia: violations of young workers rights in Moscow region

It is no secret that McDonald’s is the place where students often get a job during their studies to earn some extra income – the work does not require any specific qualifications, and the work schedules are flexible. That is why the number of young workers in this fast food chain’s restaurants is high. However a recent inspection by Moscow region’s prosecutor’s office and regional labor inspector has identified numerous violations of those employees’ rights.

The inspection covered the restaurants in Dmitrovskiy, Odintsovskiy, Podolskiy, Pushkinskiy, and Shelkovskiy districts, as well as those in the capital’s suburban towns Balashiha, Kolomna, Krasnogorsk and Khimki. It uncovered the fact that the labor contracts  did not contain clauses related to the nature of work, working conditions, hours of work and breaks as well as wages. Additonally, violations of the young workers rights were discovered.

Many of the young workers  were hired without the mandatory prior medical check paid by the employer. In all the inspected restaurants the juvenile employees had to perform some work in harmful and dangerous working conditions, like frying semi-finished food in deep fryers with boiling oil and cleaning toilets. The law does prohibits  persons under the age of 18 from doing such jobs. It also forbids the same person from preparing of food and cleaning public toilets which could spread infectious diseases.

In a number of restaurants teenagers who had not been to safety trainings were still allowed to work. Many were not provided uniforms and personal protection gear. Violations of limits on duration of the working day and work shifts established by the law were found to be common practice, including for those workers combining work and studies. What is more, some workers were not paid the due amounts of wages on the last day of their employment.

Following the inspection’s results 11 cases of administrative violations were initiated according to part 1 of article 5.27 of the Administrative violations’ code (breaches of labor and occupation safety legislation). The General Director of McDonald’s LLC Alexei Smirnov was issued an order to eliminate the identified violations of labor law and the rights of young workers.