Apple has published results from their Supplier Work-Hour Compliance report which tracks over 1 million supplier employees to ensure they comply with Cupertino's 60-hour work week limitation. It is good news this time around as 99 percent of Apple's suppliers met the required hourly limit in January 2013, the company's best showing to date.
Apple points out on their Supplier Responsibility page that they have revamped and expanded their program to track employees' weekly work hours. Starting in 2011, the company began tracking hours worked at a handful of suppliers. If excess hours were found, Apple said they were able to address the problems quickly with suppliers.
The company expanded the program over the course of 2012, publishing results each month on their website. As of January 2012, Apple tracked some 500,000 workers and by January 2013, that number had increase to over 1 million.
Cupertino's Supplier Code of Conduct limits work weeks to 60 hours except in unusual circumstances. Furthermore, all overtime must be voluntary. Apple has achieved an average of 92 percent compliance across all work weeks with the average hours worked per week under 50. Those numbers dipped to 87 percent in September and November 2012 as manufacturing revved up to build hardware like the iPhone 5 during the holiday buying season.
Apple specifically mentioned an audit of Guangdong Real Faith Pingzhou Electronics that discovered the underage labor policy had been violated 74 times. As such, the California company terminated all business ties with the supplier, highlighting their commitment to underage labor laws.