Text | Gu Lingyu, Liu Yiqin, Liu Shuqi, Cui Hao

Editor | Yu Le

At 1:30 am on December 29, 2020, Urumqi, Xinjiang , a female employee of Pinduoduo suddenly held her abdomen and fainted on the way to get off work. She was sent to the hospital and died after nearly 6 hours of rescue.

"Finance" reporters learned that this employee was an employee of the "Duoduo Maicai" business in Xinjiang during his lifetime, and joined the company as a management trainee in July 2019. Due to the time difference, one o'clock in the morning in Xinjiang is equivalent to eleven o'clock in the middle of the night in Beijing, which is also the daily off-duty time for the female employee. Pinduoduo announced that the employee was cremated on January 3.

2020 is the year when major Internet companies have entered community group buying. Giants such as Didi, JD.com, and Meituan have all made high-profile claims that they must win this war. What follows is that Large-scale cash-burning subsidies and rapid expansion. “Duoduo Maicai” is Pinduoduo’s community group buying business launched in 2020.

News of the employee’s death was first reported by a user of the workplace social platform “Maimai” in a post on the evening of January 3. On the morning of the 4th, the original page was no longer accessible. Public opinion was ignited a few hours later: A screenshot of what appeared to be Pinduoduo’s response showed: A certified Pinduoduo official account replied on the Zhihu topic “What do you think of the sudden death of a Pinduoduo employee after working overtime?”, saying, “Look Look at the people at the bottom, who are not exchanging their lives for money?" This reply was immediately deleted.

On the afternoon of the 4th, Pinduoduo confirmed that an employee died suddenly, but also claimed that the Zhihu screenshots were fake. However, "Zhihu Butler" posted that the aforementioned Pinduoduo's response on Zhihu was indeed created by the Zhihu certified account "Pinduoduo" and deleted itself less than a minute later. Pinduoduo later changed its story and stated that the content was posted by employees of Pinduoduo’s marketing cooperation suppliers using their personal mobile phones.

In 2020, Pinduoduo made great progress, with its stock price increasing by 373.59. As of the close of U.S. stocks last Wednesday, Pinduoduo’s market value had soared to US$219.6 billion, making it the third largest Internet company after Tencent and Alibaba. According to real-time data from Forbes, founder Huang Zheng's net worth reaches US$63.5 billion, surpassing Jack Ma and Ma Huateng to become China's second richest man.

At Pinduoduo’s anniversary last year, founder Huang Zheng said in his speech, “Starting a hard-core struggle mode is not an empty talk.” When it comes to why front-line employees stay up until the early hours of the morning, Huang Zheng said: "Buying food is a good business, a difficult business, a long-term business, and a touchstone for Pinduoduoduo. You pick and deliver goods while others are sleeping, so that consumers can get fresh vegetables before cooking."

However, on the first working day of the new year, a company with a halo of "creating wealth" was pushed into a "sweatshop" due to the changing public opinion in community group buying, the hottest track at the moment. on the cusp of.

On the afternoon of January 5, Pinduoduo stated that it had no new response to the incident in response to an inquiry from a reporter from Caijing.

She was only 22 years old, loved to laugh and lively, and had plans to get married before her death...According to various sources, the girl's portrait is related to the sudden death of a man who worked like crazy.

A person close to Duoduo who bought groceries told the Caijing reporter that someone around him knew the deceased girl, and this proximity made him even more uncomfortable. He confirmed that the girl’s work signature still quietly read “Guarding the Border for Duoduo.”

He said that the salary of Pinduoduo’s first-line employees in Kaicheng (responsible for local business promotion) is not as high as outsiders imagine. Many are fresh graduates with a monthly salary of more than 10,000.

Pinduoduo is known for its high-intensity work. According to him, the front-line employees of Duoduo Grocery Shop work extremely hard. In busy areas, they can even work for more than 100 consecutive days, often until the early morning.

"We all felt that it would be a matter of time before someone died, but we didn't expect it to be so soon." In an interview with a reporter from Caijing, many Pinduoduo employees made similar remarks.

Duoduo’s grocery shopping is currently Pinduoduo’s core business. The interviewed employees told the Caijing reporter that in the early days of establishment, the grocery shopping team was composed of compulsorily transferred personnel from various departments, and each business department had its own quotas and was assigned at each level. "I heard that the intensity was so high that no one wanted to go there. Whenever you inquired about the grocery shopping business, the human resources department would send an email to your direct leader saying that you requested to be transferred there."

Young and strong people will also be given priority. A former employee revealed that a colleague who studied physical education in the department was interviewed three times and was even threatened that he would not receive his year-end bonus if he did not switch to the grocery shopping business.

Even so, this business line is still in short supply of manpower. In November, Pinduoduo announced that this year’s salary increase would only be for business employees who are willing to switch to grocery shopping. The aforementioned interviewee recalled to a reporter from Caijing that the next day, his manager specifically chatted privately with the employee who proposed a job transfer, saying that shopping for groceries was very difficult and he hoped that the individual would consider it carefully.

An employee who works for Duoduo Maicai told the "Caijing" reporter that the grocery shopping business is divided into two positions: operations and technology. The employee involved in the accident is an operation, and his work includes not only local promotion, but also Go to the warehouse to move vegetables and follow the transport truck to the community site.

Their day has already started at 1-2 a.m., and they will take a rest for about 2 hours after being transported by car. They will start working again at noon the next day, and they will not get off work until 11-12 o'clock in the middle of the night. The cycle repeats.

Everyone is working on overdrive. Other departments at Pinduoduo’s headquarters have an invisible bottom line of 300 hours of work per month, while the grocery shopping business has an invisible bottom line of 380 hours. Those who are less than this invisible bottom line may be interviewed by their supervisors.

In terms of working hours, there are 13 consecutive days of work and one day off. This only day needs to be approved. "After the National Day, there is basically no normal holiday rest," the aforementioned employee said. It is a tacitly accepted practice to skip holidays. During the 8-day National Day, they only took one day off.

Pinduoduo is not the only one running wildly on the crazy track of community group buying.

Currently, Duoduo Maicai, Meituan Maicai and Didi Orange Heart Selection occupy the top tracks in the community group buying business. The first two have already entered more than 200 cities, and it is less than 4 months since the "Duoduo Buying Food" App was launched.

Internet giants are fighting one after another, and this year the battlefield has shifted to community group buying. Previously, Didi CEO Cheng Wei said in his speech that there is "no upper limit on investment" in community group buying. Liu Qiangdong proposed at the meeting that JD.com executives would personally lead JD.com to "fight a good battle for community group buying." Wang Xing also conveyed the determination that "this battle must be won" in Meituan's middle- and high-level meetings more than once.

Similar sentences have appeared in the "Taxis War", "Bicycle Sharing War", and "Takeaway War".

Indicators are handed down from level to level, and the most difficult front-line tasks can only be tackled by employees at the lowest level.

A Didi Orange Heart Select employee told the Caijing reporter. Their working hours are from 11 a.m. to 2 or 3 p.m. Due to the massive expansion of personnel, in Chengdu workplaces, employees are often crowded in the corridors or even sitting on a chair to work.

In the early days of the project, an employee on Didi’s intranet revealed that their salary would be doubled if they transferred to another job, but so far only a 20% subsidy has been added. Even so, the system of assessment and rating every three months still attracts employees to change jobs. For them, they also work overtime in other departments and have only one chance for promotion a year, but “there are opportunities everywhere.”

Previously, due to the epidemic in Wangjing area of ????Beijing, Meituan announced that all employees would be at home. Office and community group buying lines are the only exception. A person who recently joined Meituan to buy groceries mentioned to a reporter from Caijing that the work intensity is three times that of his previous one. There are no weekends, no fixed off-duty hours, and a large number of people are still being recruited.

"It's crazy, really crazy." An employee said in an interview. It was three o'clock in the morning and she had just finished her last meeting of the day. "The Internet industry is already overloaded, and the grocery shopping business is currently overloaded in this overloaded industry."

The company is a machine made of steel and iron, and every screw is being squeezed when accelerating. Senior executives are rushing into battle, employees are struggling, and even suppliers are struggling.

An anonymous vegetable wholesaler told Caijing that he contacted Didi Orange Heart Selection a few months ago to supply vegetables. He thought that if community group buying becomes larger and larger in the future, it cannot be abandoned by the times.

But he soon gave up. He told the Caijing reporter that after the supply started, he would transport the vegetables he ordered that day to Orange Heart Select's warehouse at 11 o'clock every night. "They will count the day's orders before 9 p.m. and start delivery the next morning, so all the preparations have to be done in the evening."

Before delivery, he also has to follow the instructions of Orange Heart According to the customer's requirements, the products were separated and packaged, and specific labels were affixed. For this purpose, he also purchased a labeling equipment. After it is delivered to the warehouse, the staff will check and accept it. If the delivery volume is not enough, a fine will be imposed. "For example, if he asks for 300 kilograms, and after it is delivered, he feels that 10 kilograms of it does not meet the requirements, he will be fined and there will be no time to send it again."

After cooperating with community group buying, the work schedule began to change day and night, often ending at 1 or 2 o'clock in the middle of the night. "The workers in the warehouse have even harder work. They have to sort and pack until 6 o'clock in the morning." The supplier quickly terminated the cooperation, "I'm too tired, I don't want to die from exhaustion."

Sudden death is not new in today's Chinese workplace.

In 2015, a Tencent employee died suddenly. Afterwards, his colleagues issued a petition letter calling on senior leaders to pay attention to the phenomenon of excessive overtime among employees. In 2016, Ou Jiliang, the former director of the data technology and product department of Alibaba Group, died suddenly, and Jin Bo, deputy editor-in-chief of Tianya Community, died suddenly.

Working overtime is not only the norm, it has become a generally accepted culture. Jack Ma once said, "No company should or can force employees to do 996," but "996 is a blessing that comes after repair." The Internet industry is considered to have a "35-year-old crisis" due to its high work intensity, that is, those who are over 35 years old will be eliminated by the company because their physical fitness cannot keep up.

"In Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, only companies that are about to close down do not work overtime."

In addition to the extension of daily working hours, the "big and small week" system is also being accepted by more and more companies . Recently, Kuaishou announced that in order to achieve closer cooperation between the front, middle and backends, Kuaishou will start a full-staff week on January 10, 2021.

According to my country's "Labor Law", employers have two types of employees: fixed-time working system and irregular working system. The fixed-time working system means that the daily working hours of workers shall not exceed eight hours, the average working hours per week shall not exceed 44 hours, and the employer shall ensure that workers have at least one day off per week.

The irregular work system means that enterprises can implement other work and rest methods with the approval of the labor administrative department. If the employer wants to implement an irregular working hour system, it needs to separately apply to the labor department for approval. The specific situation varies from region to region. In most cases, it should be less than 44 hours per week.

Lawyer Zhang Yanning from Beijing Tiantong Law Firm told Caijing reporters that at present, my country does not have labor public interest litigation that is widely used abroad. This is a kind of prosecution by social organizations or procuratorial organs on behalf of workers. way of right. Therefore, there are only two ways to resolve disputes. On the administrative side, the labor inspection department can take the initiative to supervise and request corrections, administrative penalties, etc.

In civil terms, employees who work overtime can sue for overtime pay. In reality, however, few people do this.

An Internet practitioner who wishes to remain anonymous has just switched jobs from Baidu to Pinduoduo.

He told Caijing reporters that he felt like he was not an employee, but a tool on the assembly line: the workstations were crowded and depressing, toilets were scarce, and time had to be calculated when eating. The project pace was extremely fast, with almost no breathing space.

Because he was too tired, he wanted to leave just one week after joining the job, but the income was indeed high. His income in 2020 is 1.8 million, including stocks. He said that Duoduo Grocery is currently the most intensive department in the company. As a technician, he works six days a week and gets off work at 11pm by default, but often works overtime until the early morning.

He didn’t think there was anything wrong with Pinduoduo. “This is a two-way choice. The company will not let you resign. If the money is large, the requirements will naturally be high.” He calculated the accounts and started to work hard. If you work hard for a year, you can buy a house in your hometown, and you can buy a villa in three years. He plans to work for a few years before returning to Baidu. "Baidu's management is much more relaxed and comfortable."

He mentioned that Pinduoduo poached many people from the WeChat team before, so that Tencent had to stand up and let WeChat and Pinduoduo have signed an agreement not to poach each other’s employees. "Pinduoduo poaches people at double or triple wages, and everyone agrees that they are here to make money."

The aforementioned Pinduoduo employees who have resigned hold similar views on this. According to his disclosure, after receiving the year-end bonus in May every year, there will be a peak for resignations. “Some people just want to make quick money. When dealing with work, they obviously push and push. In their hearts, they are just like themselves, and they are not working together as a team. Project posture."

"Most of us stay in the company for money. We are all short of money, either inherently poor or temporarily poor. The part that is not poor may be waiting for the exercise of options. . ”

Not everyone wants to exchange their lives for money, but the tide seems to be involuntarily. An investor who follows Pinduoduo told a reporter from Caijing that as major companies, Pinduoduo and Meituan still retain their "entrepreneurial spirit" and "wolf nature." This is one of the reasons why the capital market is optimistic about these two companies. " Only by working hard enough can the company grow rapidly. This is Pinduoduo’s value, and I agree with it.”

On January 4, the Shanghai Labor and Social Security Supervision Department stated that it had investigated Pinduoduo’s labor and employment conditions. During the investigation, the company's employment contract, employment hours, etc. will be examined.

A person familiar with the front-line business of Duoduo Maicai said that as of now, "after this incident (the death of the girl), the company has not changed much and continues to set various KPIs."

Pinduoduo’s company regulations do not allow employees to have private communication groups, and employees have been asked to keep silent. A Pinduoduo employee who refused to be interviewed said, "Mobile phone software can monitor, it's not convenient to say."

This incident seems to have little impact internally. The sudden death of a Duoduo grocery shopping employee was widely reported on social networks It has further fermented, but the aforementioned Pinduoduo employees still hold meetings until after 12 o'clock in the morning. "It may affect those who join the job later and choose jobs with slightly lower wages but less intensity.

Everything is silent There was no resignation or protest. On the first working day of 2021, the news of the girl’s departure was like a stone sinking into the hearts of some people. “Let’s commemorate it in our hearts. "A Pinduoduo employee said, "It's hard to express opinions because I'm afraid the company will have ideas. ”