Paper round, slave labour?

[dingit]

Ds just been offer a paper round 100 papers £3. This doesn't sound too bad, but it's also the steepest hill in the village, and long driveways.

I think 100 papers would take longer than an hour.

It's not worth it, I think the time would be far better spent studying or doing an extra curricular activity.

DS doesn't do his all in one go. He does our road, comes back for refreshments then goes out again. It's only one evening a week so plenty of time for footy/socialising/homework etc.

It's about more than the money IMO.

However one mum said to me that her little cherub wouldn't get out of bed for that. Fine but he's the one always saying he can't go out because he has no money.

Dd did the free papers at 14 she got paid peanuts meh its fine if they want to do it she did it till she couldnt be arsed anymore they started wanting her to do leaflets as well and stopped doing it. Let your son do it im sure the poppet will manage the hill

Once they are 16 they can get a 'proper' job so to speak.

I had a once-a-week Saturday paper round that I used to get paid £14 for when I was 14 in the late 1990s.

I did it properly for four weeks then in week five I dumped all the papers in the bin, still got paid but got sacked.

I'm sure it was meant to teach me something but for the life of me I have no idea what.

My boys used to earn between £20 and £25 a week, delivering around 15 papers a day, 7 days a week. They did this for about 4-5 years each, and did feel that they worked really hard for their money - however, there weren't really any other jobs for kids their age that paid even that amount.

£3 for 100 papers sounds really, really low.

I once tried one of those rounds some years ago. It was a local freebie paper. 100 papers or more, to be delivered within a 2 hour time slot.

It wasn't do-able in that time due to the nature of the round and the fact that I had three young children at the time (was a tad over-optimistic taking it on when DD3 was a baby). It was slave labour, made me miserable and I jacked it in.

My DD2 has had a paper round of her own for about three years now. She delivers daily papers (Telegraph, Guardian, Daily Mail etc. Around 10 - 20 of them every morning, and it takes her about half an hour. She gets £20 per week for it, which suits her needs well.

Give it a try if you want, but my own experience of delivering local freebies has turned me against them. One of the ways they keep their costs down is by paying the bare minimum (shite) to their delivery people. That and maximising the amount of advertising space so that the news itself is almost incidental to it.

DS used to do nearly 200 papers, and it took about 2 hours.

He stopped as he felt it wasn't worth it. Apparently he would rather have no money at all.

I did one of the freebie paper rounds when I was a teen, about 180 papers? Got extra for leaflets. I delivered to an air force housing estate. I worked out a route that was quickest. Had to do it in two lots as I couldn't carry all the papers at once. I had a bag and it was bloody heavy. I guess the money was shit but I saved up and bought myself my first mountain bike. It did suck in the middle of winter, but it still taught me value of money etc. It took about an hour an a half once a week to deliver, if I was lucky my mum had already put the leaflets into the papers for me, if not I had to do it myself.

Tbf it is pretty shit money dd had to bag the papers put leaflets in and the deliver she had 3 estates to do and at 14 she had the attention span of a gnat so easily distracted we ended up sorting the papers into the trolley but i let her have a go at it.

She is 20odd now and not work shy

LynetteScavo, I did it because I had very little money. I stopped it because it was slave labour, added nothing significant to the family budget and didn't sit at all well with having mostly sole responsibility for three young children, one of whom was still a baby.

My SIL had a similar experience.

I truly understand why someone would give these rounds up, and why there is a high turnover rate. They are exploitation. I felt exploited and it was a miserable existence. Life was much better without.

Nobody appreciates having the local freebies delivered either. No tips for them.

By contrast, my DD2 has had some very generous tips on her round over the years, particularly in the run-up to Christmas. She ended up with well over £100 in extra money last December. At Easter too (though not so much) some people give her tips or chocolate. I guess it is because she is delivering papers they actually want, rather than ones which are foisted upon them.

Crikey. Definitely a sign of the times.

I did a paper round for years when I was at senior school - about 25 daily newspapers I think, took about 20-25 minutes (plus 10 mins to cycle there and back). Left home about 6.45, got back about 7.30, went back to bed for half an hour and then got up for school! £2.50 for 6 days a week.

You could also do a Sunday round which lasted about 1 hour, papers were really heavy and you had to go back to the newsagents to re-stock your bag halfway through. That was £2.50 just for Sunday, but you couldn't have a Sunday round unless you did the week too!!

Christmas tips were ace . I think I made about £60 one year which bought me a double tape stereo.

I think for £3 for 100 local papers, it depends what the roads are like. I live on a cul-de-sac of 40 houses (normal semi-detached houses). Had to drop a leaflet through every door last night and it took about 15 minutes.

That's pretty rubbish.
My DS does between 12-16 papers a day, 6 days a week.
He also has to collect the money once a week.
He gets paid about £18 pw.
His round is quite spread out, but he does it on his bike, takes about 40 mins.
He thinks he's quids in.
I give him pocket money on top of it.

at 18 i worked a job that paid me £1.99 per hour. for that i stood on my feet for 9 hours a day with a twenty minute break. but it taught me a lesson about working hard for my money.