Union says some at Google have less access to virus test
Full-time Google employees have access to at-home coronavirus tests for themselves and their families, but that’s not the case for thousands of company contractors and temporary workers, according to a Google engineer.
A Google spokesperson said in an email that the company has free, athome and in-person testing options available to employees as well as temps and vendors.
But Ashok Chandwaney, a software engineer at Google and member of the Alphabet Workers Union, said in a statement that access was unequal for the company’s contingent workforce.
“Right now all full-time Google employees, even if they are exclusively working from home, have been offered at-home COVID tests,” said Chandwaney, a member of the executive committee of the minority union that includes several hundred Alphabet employees and outside contractors.
Chandwaney said the tests allowed for nearinstantaneous results but that the company’s thousands of temporary, vendor and contract workers do not have the same access, with only on-site workers having access to mail-in testing or on-site instead of at-home tests.
The union formed early last year to advocate for change at Google and its parent company, Alphabet, on a variety of labor and social issues.
Access to tests, both lab-run PCR checks and at-home nasal and throat swabs, has become difficult in the Bay Area and elsewhere as the omicron variant surges and drives daily coronavirus case counts to new heights. Pharmacy shelves are often sold out of the popular at-home rapid tests and waits for lab tests can stretch from hours to days, with heavy backlogs for results.
A Google spokesperson said in an email that employees and members of what it called its “extended workforce” in the U.S., apparently referring to temps, vendors, and contractors, can get athome PCR tests through nasal swabs along with other testing options.
The company said its goal is to make testing more accessible and offers free at-home and in-person testing options to employees and their dependents and household members as well as its “extended workforce who work at our sites.”
“We offer free Cue rapid at-home tests for our employees and an onsite Cue testing program available to Google’s extended workforce at our data centers,” the spokesperson said.
Temporary, vendor, and contract workers make up a significant portion of the company’s outside workforce and can include roles from engineering to catering. Many have been working from home or, in some cases, been paid to stay home as the company’s offices have been mostly shuttered during the pandemic.
A message the union posted on its Twitter page, which it said was from Google, said the testing service was available to Google employees and interns in the U.S. as well as their dependents at home at no cost.
The document said that in addition the at-home tests were available to “any members of the extended workforce on assignment to Google who are currently eligible to work on-site.”