Self employed Courier Driver

Wrd90

I have an interview to become a self employed courier driver next week, the rough details of the job are £105.00 per day, working 5 days over 7 ( 6 days if overtime
Is available ), £167.00 per week to rent ford transit van ( which i will need to ). I have never been self employed before, my current job is multi drop deliverys but im not self employed, i get an hourly rate of £7.20 which is one of the lowest as far as im aware, i wont shame the company. Could someone shed some light on what the basics of being self employed are, would i need an accountant? Is it actually going to be worth my while? At the moment monthly i earn between £700-£1000. Thanks

andygb

You would most probably need an accountant to help you with the tax implications.
I believe that you will be paying tax on your income AFTER expenses, and the expenses would include the hire of the van and fuel etc.

SomeRandomGuy

I don't know what company you are applying to but just be careful if it is something like Yodel. Examine the figures very carefully. Having investigated this option I found that while the headline figures look good the reality is a bit different. You might get paid to do X number of drops only to discover it takes you 12 hours a day to do so.

Self employed you will presumably have to pay for fuel, maintenance of the van and so on. Not to mention sorting out your accounts and tax return which is additional 'work' time or money you have to pay out to an accountant.

Being "self-employed" like this can sometimes just be a dodge for the company hiring you to avoid tax and employment rights. It basically means they can treat you almost like a slave because the moment you complain you will not have any more work and they have no obligation towards you at all.

Wrd90

Thanks for the info. It makes a lot of sence the way you described how the situation could turn out. It does look good to begin with but it does seem to have a catch like everything else

swingaloo

Friend of ours is a courier for a national company. It looks great on paper but after all his expenses (dont forget courier insurance) he scrapes a living. The company he works for also insist his vehicles is not over 3 years old.

xapprenticex

The fuel costs will kill you.

paddedjohn

Working a 5 day week you will end up worse off, £105 minus about £33 for the van leaves £72. Out of this you will have to pay for fuel and possibly insurance for carriage of goods and then you will most probably be working 10/12 HR days so will end up on less than min wage

paddedjohn

Add to the above the fact that any holidays you take will be unpaid and if the van breaks down you won't get paid while not turning a wheel

makeyourdaddyproud

paddedjohn wrote: »

Add to the above the fact that any holidays you take will be unpaid and if the van breaks down you won't get paid while not turning a wheel

I heard somewhere that not only will you not get paid, you will be charged for the cover of your route but correct me if I have oversimplified.

I would say this is not viable, but not for the reasons stated above; you are likely to procure a route that has previously been given to someone aspirational (like yourself) but rapidly found out that the route is mainly rural in nature, with longer road time between drops thus making it financially unviable.

All the close knit routes where the time between drops is least have been given out and cherished long ago.

It only downside i'm afraid.

Marktheshark

Srick with what you have now and keep looking.

Common sense must tell you its not really self employment is it, so that means they are running a minimum wage avoidance scam and you will be making up the shortfall.

xapprenticex

167 pw for a van, its cheaper to buy one on finance.