Independent Courier Driver Jobs: How Long Does it Take to Get Paid [UK]

Finding the right independent courier driver jobs depend on a variety of factors. Not least knowing how long it will take for you to get paid.

If you’ve wondered what the best payment schedule is for you (daily, weekly, or monthly) then you’re not alone. It can be tough to juggle all of your finances when you’re not sure of your regular income.

So what are the options for independent courier driver delivery jobs and what are the likely payment schedules that you can expect?

In this post, Pete will break down what you can expect whether subcontracting, self-employed, or working for a courier company. Along with all the pros and cons to help you:

• Make the most money
• Live the life you want
• Choose the type of courier driving you need to live better

This is part of a series of regular posts from Pete the Courier Driver with hints and tips for delivery drivers. If you’re new to delivery driving, make sure to also check out How to Make Money as a Courier.

Let’s get started.

Independent Courier Driver Jobs: How Long Does it Take to Get Paid?

Hi. I’m Pete the courier driver, and today’s video is on how long can you expect to wait before you get paid as a courier. It’s the one that we all want to know about. And as always, there’s no straightforward answer to this one because it depends on which path you decide to go down.

There are different ways you can run as a courier. You can run as a local firm. You can run one of the big firms, the multi-drop firms, like your Argos, your Amazon, your Hermes. You can run on a platform like a self-employed driver, like we do, called a Courier Exchange. Or you can run as man and van.

1. Local Courier Companies

So to give you a quick run-through, if you’re going to join a local firm: Speedy Sprint, they’ve all got their names. You can just Google them. They’ll be in the area, you’ll go down, they’ll check you out: you got your van, you got your insurance; it’s all good.

They’re all going to have their own rules. Some of them might go, “We pay weekly.” Some might be, “We pay monthly.” You can have a conversation. Sometimes you’ll have a negotiation with the guy and they’ll go, “Well, this is it,” or “We might pay daily at the end of each job.”

You don’t know; everyone is different. You can guarantee the quicker they pay, the chances are there’s always going to be strings attached to these things. But they’re going to do it their own way.

2. Large Multi-drop Companies

If you go for one of the bigger firms, if you go for your Amazon, or your Hermes, or stuff like that, then you can expect to be paid in four weeks.

Now, these guys are going to expect you to work. They will throw all the work they possibly can at you. You can have Monday to Friday, or to Saturday, Sunday; seven days a week. They’ll throw as much work and they’ll give you as many drops as they can.

For this reason, I recommend, if you’re going to do one of these, get yourself a decent app. Particularly to start with, when you’re like a rabbit in the headlights, you really need to find out where you’re going. I recommend Circuit; I think it’s the best.

But if this is the way you’re going to go, and it is quite an easy way to go: you’re not really dependent on the size of motor you’ve got; the different size of vans doesn’t really matter so much; very easy entry; very easy access; that kind of thing.

Like I say, they are going to expect you to go mad but what they will do is, you’ll know what you’re going to get.

At the end of four weeks, they will say, “This is how much you’re going to get,” and then the money will go in the bank, bosh, the following week, bang; regular as clockwork. And you’ll know what’s going in and you can budget accordingly.

3. Independent Courier Driver Jobs: Subcontracting

If you run as we do, you run on this thing called a Courier Exchange (CX), then everyone’s different. Because the way that works is it’s a subcontracting network, so every person you do a job for is going to have their own rules.

The job I’m doing at the moment might be for ‘as fast as possible’ couriers. The next job I’m doing might be for ‘A to B’ couriers. ‘As fast as possible’ might pay in 14 days. A to B might pay after 60 days from the end of the month.

So one firm’s going to pay me in two weeks, one firm’s going to pay me in three months.

And these are things that you take into account when you look at the job, and you think, “Ooh. Might not want to work for those guys; that’s going to take a little while.” So if you’re going to go that route, I would say the best thing you can do is you’re going to need about three months’ scratch. (Editors note: That’s money saved for our non-UK readers).

You’re going to need about three months’ dough in the bank so that, should something go wrong… and you can guarantee if you need it, it’s going to go wrong; if you got it, it won’t… you got enough to cover your bills, to keep your things going.

And then once that three months have rolled over, it’s okay because you’ll be paid for Month 1, and then when you’re working Month 4, Month 2’s money will come in, and what keeps happening is it keeps snowballing on.

4. Man and a Van or Small Removals

The fourth way, and that’s if you want to go like man and van, or if you want to go small removals or stuff like that: these jobs often pay cash, and they often pay daily. And the way you get them is you go on Gumtree, you put your advert out, or you go on your local Facebook and surrounding areas, that kind of stuff: word of mouth from people like that.

And that way, you can use that sometimes to supplement. So say, for example, you’re running your Amazon Monday to Friday, or you’re running your CX Monday to Friday, and you’re waiting for the dough to come in, but on a Saturday, you’ve got a small removal job from that flat round the corner, and that’s paying cash, that helps keep the wolf from the door.

Secret Courier Option #5

And of course, there are your own customers. If you can get your own customers, they’re the holy grail, because they’ll always pay more money, and also you can negotiate with these people. You can go, “Look, to start with, is there any chance we can have it every two weeks and I can extend it later?”

But that gives you a rough idea of the ways you’re going to go and how much money you can expect, how long you expect to get paid.

Hope it helps. There’s going to be a load more videos on all kinds of things that hopefully are helpful, so if you do like the videos, please subscribe to the channel. Everybody likes a subscriber.

And also don’t forget I’ve got my own channel, so on YouTube, it’s called Pete the Courier Driver. There are more videos on there, too. That’s it for today.

Take care. Take money.