Delivery trucks are parked at a Coupang depot in Seoul. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, Dec. 23 (Korea Bizwire) — A special counsel team raided a subsidiary of e-commerce giant Coupang Inc. on Tuesday, launching a compulsory investigation into allegations of unpaid severance pay for employees and senior prosecutors’ intervention in favor of the management.
Special counsel Ann Gweon-seob sent prosecutors and investigators to the office of Coupang Fulfillment Services, a logistics subsidiary of Coupang, in the southern Seoul district of Songpa in the morning to secure data related to the payment of severance pay.
The company is suspected of changing its employment rules in May 2023 to the disadvantage of its employees and failing to pay their severance pay. A search and seizure warrant obtained by the special counsel team reportedly lists the company as a suspect violating the Act on the Guarantee of Employees’ Retirement Benefits.
Earlier in January, the Bucheon branch office of the labor ministry sent the case to the prosecution with a recommendation for indictment. But the Incheon District Prosecutors Office’s Bucheon branch decided not to indict the company in April.
In October, prosecutor Moon Ji-seok, who was in charge of the case at that time, claimed in a National Assembly audit that senior prosecutors, including Uhm Hee-joon, then head of the Bucheon branch, pressured him to drop the charges.
(Yonhap)
