A 46-year-old dad of two claims he was made to keep delivering Amazon parcels after suffering a heart attack and calling his boss to say he had to go to hospital. Neil Martin says he was having dizzy spells and at points couldn't see what he was doing but had to keep going on his route delivering parcels for Amazon.
Neil, who is subcontracted to Amazon via an agency called Deva Logistics, starts his route at 2pm, picking up parcels fro the depot, and shortly after had to call in to say he was feeling very unwell. He called the office and got no answer, so sent a text which reads: "Mate can you call me, am getting chest pains and keep going dizzy am gonna have to go and get checked out."
Neil told the ECHO: "I started getting pains in my chest, feeling dizzy and I was getting sweaty. I ignored it for a minute or two but I started thinking no, this does not feel right. "So I pulled over and phoned the office, but it rang out, so I texted the work mobile number that I was getting chest pains and the manager rang me back. I asked if someone could come and get my packages because I wanted to go to the hospital. They told me someone could come and take half my route off me but that they couldn't do any more than that."
Delivery driver Neil Martin, from Prescot, who suffered a heart attack but was told to complete his route delivering packages for Amazon (Image: Neil Martin)
A spokesman for Deva said the company sent a driver to assist and believed Neil had been relieved of all his packages. Neil said: "I didn't realise how serious it was at the time. But it went on right through the afternoon, just getting worse and worse. The dizzy spells were so bad I kept having to pull over because I couldn't see anything."
Neil dropped the van back at the depot at around 6.30pm, hours after the symptoms began. He said: "When I got back to the depot my manager asked me if I was alright to work tomorrow and said he had a smaller route over the water I can go on. I said I need to go to hospital first before I start thinking about packages."
He returned home then went to A&E at Whiston Hospital with his wife, Susan Martin. Neil says his heart rate was around 320 beats per minute rather than the usual 85.
Neil was kept in as an inpatient for the next 10 days, where he was given medication to keep his heart rate under control. He was transferred to Liverpool Heart and Chest Hospital for an MRI scan before being allowed home to recuperate.
Neil said: "The doctors told me I had already had a heart attack and asked me why I had waited so long before coming in. I was disgusted. It made me feel like delivering packages was more important than my health. I am not blaming them for me having a heart attack, but I feel like I could have died on that road and they didn't care."
A spokesman for Deva said: "We take the safety of the independent, self-employed contractors we engage with, very seriously, and we are still investigating how the incident was handled.
"As soon as we learned Neil was unwell, one of our four standby contractors was sent to relieve him of the load and as far as we were concerned Neil had received the support that he had requested. We were not aware that Neil had been left with packages. Had we been aware we would have immediately sent another driver to relieve him.
"We have people on standby specifically to cover routes which need support at short notice, including a driver needing to finish early, illness or in the case of traffic issues or vehicle breakdown. A couple of days later our site manager texted Neil to see how he was. Neil explained what was happening, thanked the manager and a thumbs up emoji for getting in touch and would keep him informed on his progress."
The ECHO also contacted Amazon about the case. A spokesman said: “Safety is a top priority and we wish the delivery driver a speedy recovery. We have launched an immediate investigation with the delivery service provider who engages the driver.”
