I've been always wanting to try becoming an Uber driver just to see how much I can make. But, since my car doesn't qualify for Uber or Lyft since it's too old, I couldn't do it.
Now there is a way to make money from ridesharing service even with an old car... or even a bicycle!
There are few food/general item delivery service apps out now. UberEats, Doordash, Grubhub, Postmates, etc. Alot of these Apps don't care if you use a bicycle or motorcycle or an old car to deliver. So, I decided to try out Postmates!
After you sign up on their website, they will send you a credit card that you use to purchase all the item you are going to deliver. The shitty thing with this credit card is that it took 8 days for it to get to me and I couldn't start delivering without the card. Which means I only have 22days to complete my 35 deliveries for the sign up bonus. :(
Once I received the credit card, I went out to deliver the same day. It was Tuesday night and I started delivering at 7PM when I got my first order while eating dinner at my house.
I went out and after about 3miles of driving, they cancelled the order! What the hell!
Postmates do not pay you for the mileage that it takes to drive to the store to pick up the order. So, of course I did not get jack shit for the cancelled order. No mileage reimbursement, no pay for time wasted, ZERO.
Then I got the second order. Luckily, it was in the same direction I was heading. Went there, parallel parked at a meter (Hoping that I won't get a parking ticket since they don't reimburse you for parking either), ordered the food, and waited 17 minutes for the food to be ready. They pay you $0.06 for each minute that you wait at the restaurant so, I got $1.02 for this wait. Neat!!
The drive to their house was 7.95miles and they pay $0.68 per mile for the delivery route so, that's $5.41. So, with a pick up fee of $1.45 and drop off fee of $0.80, I made a total of $8.68 and no tip.
I made a total of 7 deliveries this night and no one tipped...
In the end, I made 7 deliveries in 6 hours, I drove 105 miles total, and made $43.16.
If I calculate the wear and tear on the car + gas cost using the Federal standard rate of $0.58/mile, I come out at -$17.74 loss($43.16 - 105miles * $0.58/mile). Definitely not worth it! Maybe this service is just not worth it in Detroit because everything is so far spaced apart. Maybe in a big city like New York or San Francisco where everything is close by, you can ride bicycles to deliver so it's worth it.
Like these guys
I'm going to try delivering around noon next time to see how I will do. So, stay tuned!