"National Day is a rare golden working period in a year. Why should we rest?" This holiday, Zhao Fei (pseudonym), who has worked in Zhengzhou Foxconn for nearly five years, is still at the front end of the iPhone16 assembly line. He said that because workers’ salaries and company orders are at a high level at the same time, "almost no one will choose to take a holiday during the National Day".
"As in previous years, the salary for the National Day holiday this year is three times that on weekdays." Zhao Fei said that from October 1 ST to October 3 rd, the company paid wages according to the daily three times; From October 4 th to October 5 th, because it belongs to the weekend, it will be paid twice as much as usual; Wages on October 6 and October 7 are the daily level.
Before the National Day holiday, domestic consumer electronic products ushered in intensive release. On the mobile phone side, Huawei MateXT tri-folding screen mobile phone, iPhone16, Glory Magic V3 and Meizu Lucky 08 AI appeared one after another; In terms of automobiles, according to incomplete statistics, nearly 50 new cars including Huawei Zhijie R7 and Chery Tiggo 8 PLUS went on the market in September.
"I’ve been so busy recently that I’ve been working as soon as I entered the workshop." Li Wei (pseudonym) is in charge of the whole machine test of iPhone16 in an electronics factory in Jiangsu. Because the new machine has just been listed, the factory has added production lines since August and increased the manpower reserve.
He said that the factory is a "two-shift" production mode, and he has been working on the night shift for more than a month. He has not been informed to switch to the day shift system, and he is already "tired and dizzy".
"Although tired, everyone is generally willing to work overtime for high salary." Li Wei said that during the National Day holiday, high unit salary and high order volume will show a "multiplier effect". "April to August every year is the off-season of sales of consumer electronics. At that time, there were not many orders, and everyone didn’t even have the opportunity to work overtime." Li Wei said that his personal workload has reached the "full production" standard of the factory. "My other partner and I are now testing 12,000 mobile phones every day, with an average of 6,000 mobile phones per person every day."
Li Wei said that he can only adjust himself when he is busy. "After entering the workshop for two hours, you can use these two hours to think about all the happy things to neutralize the boring work".
IPhone sales fell short of expectations
Zhengzhou Foxconn reduces production by reducing recruitment.
On September 26th, a report from Morgan Stanley pointed out that the average delivery time of iPhone 16 from booking to today was 14 days, which was the shortest in all cycles in the past five years, which meant that the sales of iPhone 16 series were less than expected. Prior to this, Guo Ming, a well-known analyst, said that the pre-order sales of iPhone 16 series were about 37 million units in the first weekend, which was about 12.7% lower than the sales of iPhone 15 in the same period last year.
Another set of data also shows that the iPhone 16 market is in a downturn. Barclays Bank analysts Tim Long and George Wang pointed out in the report that due to lower-than-expected demand, Apple may have cut production of iPhone 16 series in the fourth quarter. The data of spare parts procurement shows that the iPhone 16 series has cut about 3 million units.
Canalys data shows that the sales of iPhone 15 series in the second quarter of this year were also lower than expected. Among the iPhones sold in the second quarter, the proportion of four iPhones 15 was 67%, which was less than 79% of the iPhone 14 series in the second quarter of last year, a decrease of more than 10 percentage points.
Or affected by the overall decline in iPhone sales, during the National Day this year, Zhengzhou Foxconn was not as busy as in previous years. Zhao Fei said that the factory reserved a batch of manpower in September, and opened the recruitment channel on October 4th, but the recruitment efforts were reduced compared with previous years, "maybe only half the level of previous years", and at the same time, the number of additional production lines this year was not as good as the same period last year.
Zhao Fei said that before the National Day, it was generally a stage of "mass production" in factories, and only some production lines were working overtime this year. "The production line responsible for the production of iPhone16 is busy, and the daily working hours of workers are about 11 hours, all week round. The production line responsible for the foreign orders of the iPhone15 series has almost no overtime work. "
Changes in working hours have affected the income of some workers. "Workers who are responsible for the production of old models will have their income reduced accordingly with the change of overtime hours." At present, the reward of returning workers is considerable among all workers.
Zhao Fei said that Foxconn’s workers are mainly divided into three types: return workers, hourly workers and regular workers. Fee-returning workers refer to workers who join the company within a specific period of time, and they can get a bonus of 7,000-8,000 yuan after the three-month construction period.
"On average, the monthly salary of Zhengzhou Foxconn returning workers is about 5,000-6,000 yuan; Hourly workers are workers who are paid according to the working hours. The hourly wage is about 26 yuan, working 8 hours a day, and the overtime hours are not fixed; The remuneration of regular workers is calculated by the basic salary of about 2,200 yuan, plus irregular overtime pay. "
The factory has emerged as a "king of rolls"
Work 12 hours a day
Not all electronics factory workers were paid three times during the National Day.
Zhang Hao (a pseudonym), a junior, worked as an intern in a factory in Wenzhou, where she worked as an OEM for Volkswagen, Chery and other car companies, and was responsible for testing some parts. He said that during the holiday, the factory only paid double wages on October 2 and October 3, and the rest of the time was the daily salary level.
"Even if you don’t get three times the salary, it won’t affect everyone’s work enthusiasm." Zhang Hao said that after the employment agency and the school provide internship opportunities, they will draw part of the commission from the college students’ labor remuneration. His hourly salary is 16 yuan, and he wants to work overtime during the National Day to increase his income.
"April to June is the off-season of the factory every year. At that time, everyone’s average salary was only more than 3,000 yuan. As car companies introduced new cars one after another, a number of’ roll kings’ emerged in the factory, working from 8 am to 10 pm, except for meals. Working for up to 12 hours a day, and going to other working groups to help on rest days." Zhang Hao told the Times Weekly reporter.
The increase in orders has caused some workers to "roll up" and brought pressure to some workers.
"The impression of the outside world on the assembly line usually stays on the keywords of’ repetition’ and’ boring’. In fact, the workshop is also a small society, especially in the busy stage, and it seems that everyone is more likely to have conflicts." Li Wei said that as the workload increases, the probability of omissions will also increase. "After the omission, it is inevitable to be scolded by the team leader."
Liu Ying (not his real name), who is engaged in testing at Foxconn, told Times Weekly that when he is busy, he should maintain a good relationship with his partner and superiors.
He said that each station in the factory will roughly assign two workers to cooperate to complete a task. If the partner is inefficient, it will also affect his own rhythm. Liu Ying also said that he prefers night shift to day shift, "because there is no leader to inspect the night shift".
Zhao Fei recalled to the Times Weekly reporter that he had always been kind to junior workers, but only once criticized a worker for an omission. As a result, the worker took advantage of the meal break and hid more than a dozen prototypes on the production line. "I have been looking for a week, but I still haven’t found a few."
Li Wei told the Times Weekly reporter that although it was the peak of employment, there were also many workers who left the electronics factory during the National Day.