Self employed Amazon delivery driver

[Vinno]

Hi all,

I recently went to an interview/induction thing for the above role and I'm still a bit confused as to how the whole thing works. Hopefully someone here has either done this in the past or knows something about it!

The job itself is classed as self employed and you deliver for this company on behalf of Amazon.

You get paid £110 daily and have to use your own van, or you can rent one from them for the princley sum of £210/week with insurance etc included (seems like a lot to me).

There is a daily bonus of either £5, £20 or £25 depending on "things". You get reimbursed for fuel.

He also went through some explanation about how if you get VAT registered then it will work out that you get more money because of various tax calculations. I really dont understand that even after asking an accounts friend of mine.

The guy who did the session didnt speak the best English so a lot of things were lost on me and he couldnt really articulate it much better so I just stopped asking questions.

Each delivery run is timed at 8 hours, but before that starts you have to come to the depot and pick/scan and load your parcels for the day. I can imagine that it would take more than 8 hours from things I have read online.

I always refrained from even applying for these types of roles before because I always perceived them to be a kind of slave labour with their daily and not hourly pay.

Can anyone shed any light on this job at all or answer any of the questions?

I have a 5 week job lined up for the Christmas period which I dont want to give up just to do this for a week and quit out of exhaustion.

Cheers!

 

[Minibiker]

Im not sure how it works with Amazon but i work in DPD warehouse and know a fair bit on how it works for our drivers.

With any of our drivers who are self employed they:

-Get paid per stop that gets delivered

-Using a DPD van costs more a month

-Using your own van saves you money which means you can earn more

-Their days are usually 9 hours ish as they have to come in a scan their stops then head out onto the road

-Each stop is on a time limit so its in, deliver, out and onto next stop

-No bonuses are added to our drivers but most of them earn enough as it is

Sorry if this isn't any help

 

[~Divine~Wind~]

Not really sure whats going on here tbh, sounds a bit iffy.

Sounds like a 3rd party getting involved on amazon flex and using it to hire out vehicles.
amazon flex tends to pay £55 per slot and if you are doing Prime Now you can get tips from customers.
AFAIK Amazon are currently still supplying the business aspect of insurance as well.

My suggestion would be to google Amazon Flex and get the app installed on your mobile.
No need to give up your current job grab delivery slots where available and when you cba

 

[Kenai]

Not really sure whats going on here tbh, sounds a bit iffy.

Sounds like the standard Amazon Logistics setup to me, self employed, sort yourself out and get paid a day rate to deliver a day's worth of packages. Rumour has it, it's amongst the bottom of the barrel as far as multi drop delivery driving goes.

 

[Kenai]

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-england-37708996

Join Amazon Logistics if you too wish to spend your time at work crapping in a bag.

 

[Vinno]

Haha I actually saw that article the other day which hasnt filled me with confidence.

It definitely isnt some kind of Amazon Flex scam since the induction thing was at the Amazon building. I am waiting for my Flex background checks to come through so I will be trying that out whenever that may be.

 

[Akagi]

No idea why you would want to do this to yourself tbh... There must be better jobs you can go for.

 

[Uther]

Looked into this a while back, if you have a day off (sick for example) if you can't find someone to cover your shift they 'fine' you £150 or something. That alone would be enough to make me walk away.

 

[Liquid_Entity]

Get paid per stop...hmmm No wonder at the end of my street under a bush is all the courier cards that state people apparently weren't in when they apparently knocked on the door.

 

[Mujja]

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-england-37708996

Join Amazon Logistics if you too wish to spend your time at work crapping in a bag.

The invoice in that link shows insurance for the vehicle hire with an excess for £5000. Does that mean you pay the first £5000 for any accident claim?

They also deduct personal mileage. You may need to take a different route, to the optimal route calculated by Amazon, due to road works or congestion and it seems get penalised.

 

[~Divine~Wind~]

Sounds like the standard Amazon Logistics setup to me, self employed, sort yourself out and get paid a day rate to deliver a day's worth of packages. Rumour has it, it's amongst the bottom of the barrel as far as multi drop delivery driving goes.

So is this more of an applied for job rather than flex? Flex was pretty easy, fill in a few forms, send a bit info and watch some videos.
My mate has done a fair few of them now too sometimes well within the time frame provided.
The only downside that hes mentioned is that if you finish a slot early you cant another up until the slot has met finish time.

Whilst certainly not a full time job you should be able to pick and choose the slots you work and get paid for them.

 

[Rroff]

To be frank this is a job where you either have a handle on it, ideally with your own van already and a good idea how to play the game or it can be a pretty miserable experience.

As an aside many retailers run their own home delivery and/or van network for moving stuff intra-business which can be a bit less miserable to work for though potentially lower earning potential.

 

[mattyg]

To be frank this is a job where you either have a handle on it, ideally with your own van already and a good idea how to play the game or it can be a pretty miserable experience.

As an aside many retailers run their own home delivery and/or van network for moving stuff intra-business which can be a bit less miserable to work for though potentially lower earning potential.

The problem is some people think its easy..It does get easier, with experience. But driving for a living is more difficult than people think. Especially multi drop!!!

 

[Kaka]

From the BBC article, it says you're expected to deliver up to 200 parcels a day?! What kind of foolishness...

 

[mattyg]

From the BBC article, it says you're expected to deliver up to 200 parcels a day?! What kind of foolishness...

How many of those where to the same addresses. Its headline grabbing thats all. People think they have to drive 5 miles between jobs. When in reality Some routes only cover 50 miles per day

 

[Vinno]

After having some time to think about this and getting advice from family I think I'm going to give it a miss.

 

[Robert]

Check the panarama episode about this. Sounded horrific! Think some drivers where essentially “told” to break speed limits.

 

[Vonhelmet]

Check the panarama episode about this. Sounded horrific! Think some drivers where essentially “told” to break speed limits.

Pooing in a carrier bag in your van and the like. Sounds awesome.

 

[koolpc]

Better driver job here if interested:

https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/the-amd-driver-thread.18643923/

 

[A Vagabond Driver]

I think it could be OK if they wouldn't threaten you with a £150 fine when you are not up for it, it seems like there's 0 flexibility. Have you considered different driving / delivery jobs? I know Uber and deliveroo are piecework and have more flexibility but you are still expected to do a minimum. There's Beelivery too, you don't get as many orders but they seem to pay the most per delivery and you get to pick and choose which orders you do.