Who is out of order here?

[fornical]

I run a healthy meal delivery company. I have several delivery drivers, however, having an issue with one in particular. My delivery drivers are self employed. Deliveries happen on a Saturday.

Long story short, I've had one of my delivery drivers for over a year now. I pay her £10 per hour and 45 pence per mile. She drives from Essex to London to collect the deliveries then back to Essex to deliver them every Saturday. She arrives to collect them at 9 am.

I text her asking for the next six weeks if she could be at pick up point at 8 am rather than 9 am.

She replied - 'See to be honest, it’s unsociable hours with it being so early at the weekend and having to get Amelia out of bed etc. I’d have to put my price up to £15 per hour. Let me know if you would be happy to go ahead with that or not. If you can’t though don’t worry I understand, It just means I’ll have to be getting up at 6.30 on a Saturday and my daughter too. Just wouldn’t be worth my while for tenner an hour xx'

AIBU to think this is totally unreasonable and out of the blue? How did she jump from £10 an hour to £15 because I asked her to come in one hour earlier. Am I being unreasonable?

Ditto

Yabu. If an hour doesnt make a difference then why should it matter to you either?

Getting a child out the house by 6.30 is much more inconvenient/antisocial thwn 7.30am.

Yanbu to ask, she is not being unreasonable to say no, or say only for more money.

OP stated she only pays her for half the driving- from London to Essex- and this is “4hrs”.

She expects her to drive into London for free from furthest Essex…. Which if she is up towards Sudbury way and then has to drive to say west or south London….that can be 2-4hrs given the M25 and setting off at 7:30am.

An hour in bed at the weekends is a big deal.

No it's not. It is £9.50 and going up to £10.40 something in April.

If they are self employed they can change their priced and it is up to you if you pay it or stop using them.

I'm sure this has been said many times. I've not the whole thread yet.

Self employed, so she can ask what she wants. Up to you if you accept it.

Absolutely this.

Yabu and a cf

She's self-employed so can set her own pay.

If you want the privileges of having an employee then you also need to give them the protection of being an employee.

You are being unreasonable. She's self-employed. Her rules I'm afraid and I thinks she's being very fair quite frankly.

I think she's being incredibly reasonable, £10 an hour is peanuts as a self employed rate given you don't get holiday pay, sick pay, pension, I've always gone with the rule of thumb that when paying a contractor expect to pay anywhere from 25-100% more per hour than you would do for someone employed. And I use 14 contractors reguarly and a further 6 irregularly in my business so I do have some knowledge of this area. Regardless she's approached it calmly and professionally, you can meet her rate (which as someone self employed she sets) or you can tell her that isn't within your budget and look for someone else.

That's a shocking rate of pay you've been offering her. No wonder she's suggesting such a big jump. I can't imagine it's worth her while.

London living wage is £11.95

Minimum wage isn’t exactly a good wage! It’s very hard to live off in this day and age.

That’s why your supposed to pay a fair hourly rate when someone is self employed you numpty.

The driver isn’t even being paid for the journey to the pick up location 😖sounds like a bad gig indeed.

Paying £10 an hour self employed is a disgrace. Not paying travel time to collect is a disgrace. Not paying any form of sick pay, holiday, tax, n.i. because someone only works four hours a week is a disgrace.

Your employee's are using vehicles to make these deliveries, 1in100 professional drivers are involved in RTA, you are making zero provision for this risk and it is highly doubtful that the employees will have appropriate car insurance.

You are knowingly taking the absolute proverbial out of this country, out of these people.

If you can't afford to pay properly then you don't have a viable business.

Cannot believe what I have read, there is only one person being unreasonable here and it's you OP. Sorry to be so blunt but you need a big wake up call.

'No worries, I will find someone else who can accomodate. It's been nice working with you' - I am sure she will soon change her tune!

If she does, it'll be because she is desperate, not because the OP's offer is remotely decent.

I'd be ashamed to pay someone so poorly. Genuinely shocked that the OP could be coming on here thinking she's in the right with this.

When she would be better off financially in a local minimum wage job? I'm not convinced...

You're paying badly and with bad conditions, you won't be able to keep good workers for long (unless they don't know they're being exploited, or you have some sort of hold over them). This woman should quite rightly walk away. If she does agree to stay, you need to re-think your pay and conditions. To put it briefly: self-employed contractors should be paid ABOVE the average that an employee would get in the same role, this is to cover them for things that you don't pay for (holidays, sickness etc.), you are paying significantly BELOW the going rate for a driver in London or the SE, and below the living wage.

So she gets paid for 4 hours - £40.. for driving from Essex to London (for which she doesn't get paid but she has to get there).. in her own vehicle, which she then uses to drive back to Essex to deliver your food.

Minimum wage does not apply in this case because she is self employed, she has to pay all of her taxes and business expenses including her own holiday, pension, sick pay, the fact that she has to fit other jobs in but commit to keeping the 4 hours (plus her own travel time) free.. her rate should be higher that minimum wage.

Maybe you have other drivers who are desperate and will do it for this amount - but it really does not seem like a fair exchange for her services... based on the information you have provided.

So she drives from Essex to London on her own time, then drives back to Essex and presumably you stop paying her when she’s finished delivering in Essex?

You are massively taking the p*.

You should be paying her from Essex to Essex.

If she was London based you should pay London to London.

I’m with the driver on this one.

Do u pay her cash? If so I am not sure why people are saying its a terrible rate of pay. I highly doubt she is paying her tax and ni

£40 for 4 hours work + 2- 3 hours driving @.45p and I doubt she’s even breaking even on her fuel costs for running her car, are you serious op ?

Say no. The go and see if you can find someone else who will do that for 10 quid an hour, excluding the time nd expense of coming to you to collect.