What It’s Like Working as an Amazon Flex Delivery Driver
By: Brendan O'Connor
Tags: Gig Economy, Work, Business, Amazon, Industry

Medium: What does a normal day driving look like?

Kris Marv: Typically, I wake up at 5 a.m. I reserve my DoorDash hours and then I start “tapping” for Amazon. You tap and swipe on your phone until they drop the blocks and you gotta try to scoop one up before anyone else gets it. It’s super competitive and lately, it’s been super difficult to get blocks.

If I’m doing DoorDash, usually I’ll reserve my hours for 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., because I’ve got to drop my kids off at school in the morning and then I’ve gotta pick them up in the afternoon. So, I try to get my work in while they’re at school. And that’s pretty much similar with Amazon. The blocks typically start anywhere from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. and go over anywhere from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. So, it ends up working out nice for me.

It sounds like this may vary from week to week, but do you have a sense of your hourly breakdown doing Flex, DoorDash, and other stuff?

For Flex, it’s $20 an hour, if you’re working the warehouse, or it’s $18 an hour plus tips, if you’re doing things like Prime Now or Whole Foods. It’s been so few and far between for Amazon right now. I’m only probably doing one block a week with them. I’m also signed up for Postmates and Walmart delivery, as well as Shipt. (Ed: Shipt is another delivery service.) I tried Postmates and Walmart once, just to see what it was about, and I’ve been kind of sticking to DoorDash and Amazon lately.

What is it about Flex and DoorDash that that makes it better than Walmart?

Just the rate. There’s more money in Flex and in DoorDash than there is in anything else. With Postmates, you don’t get to see what you’re making for each delivery until after you do it, which is not the greatest. I want to know what I’m making off a delivery before I go and make it. Walmart delivery pays like $9.30 per delivery plus tips, but they’ll only let you make one delivery in an hour. If the customer tips you, which is not often, you’re only making $9 to $15 an hour, where with Flex and DoorDash you’re making $17 to $20 an hour.

You said that the blocks for Flex have been drying up. When did that start happening?

Right after the holidays. It’s directly linked to the holiday season. But it’s not only that — they brought in direct service partners, DSPs, which are basically van companies that work directly for Amazon. They’re kind of taking the bulk of the deliveries. We’re secondary to them. We come in and deliver what they can’t, or do the same-day routes when the DSPs are still out on the road delivering the packages from that morning. We’ll come in later in the evening and deliver the packages that were purchased for same-day, as well as Prime Now and Whole Foods. DSPs don’t dip into that.

One of the frustrations that I’ve heard drivers express is that Amazon makes changes, like with the DSPs, and then doesn’t communicate about them.

Honestly, that is the only gripe that I have with this. As far as getting blocks and making changes and stuff, I completely understand it — they’re running a business, and logistically switching over to DSPs just makes sense because it’s putting money back in their own pocket. At the end of the day, that’s business. The only gripe that I have with any of it is that they don’t communicate. You gotta do your own detective work within the community to really figure out what’s going on.

They had announced that they were going to be doing things with direct service partners… but they never really announced their intentions as far as what percentage of the packages those DSPs were going to be doing. When they release blocks in the morning, nobody really knows how many there will be, how many routes there will be. Fifty routes versus 200 routes makes a big difference in people’s minds as to whether it’s worth it to sit there and tap on their phones at 5 a.m., every morning, to try to get one. Because if you’ve got thousands of drivers in the area — again, a number nobody knows — and there’s only 50 routes going out for that morning, most people are gonna say, “Well, forget this. I’m just gonna sleep in and try for something else later or do DoorDash.”

I feel like they kind of oversaturated the market. Right before Christmas, they brought on a whole bunch of new people and that creates a problem… Now, there’s no work to be had.

Does that frustration change the way you think about Amazon? What goes through your head when you hear about Bezos’ success?

Good for him! I mean, he created something well ahead of its time and he got so far ahead of the curve that it just blew up into this monstrosity — and I mean that in a good way — that it is today. The reason he makes so much money is he, and the company as a whole, are very good at accomplishing tasks without putting themselves at risk. Five years from now, would I be at all surprised if Amazon had their own delivery service, hired their own delivery employees, and had their own vans and everything else? It wouldn’t surprise me in the least. That’s kind of the direction everything is heading.

Do you buy stuff on Amazon yourself?

Oh, yes. Quite often.

Have you ever had to deliver to yourself?

No, I have not had my own package before. But I have met people who have delivered to me because we have the Facebook groups and stuff. One of the groups I’m a part of is for Amazon Flex drivers only. It’s a local group just for the Hampton Roads area, which is what they call the area I live in, in Virginia. People will post a screenshot of their route and I’ve actually seen it before where one of the blips on their map was my house and I’m like, “Oh hey! You’re delivering my package.”

What’s the community of Flex drivers like in your area?

The community here is awesome. It’s funny, we’re all in competition with each other because when you’re trying to grab blocks you’re basically fighting for the blocks with other Flex drivers. But at the same time, we don’t treat it like a competition. We’re all still rooting for one another, we’re all hoping everybody gets a block, we’re all super friendly and we laugh and joke. It’s like a big group of friends that have known each other for years, even though a lot of us have only known each other for a few months. It’s a really good community, for sure.

How long do you plan to be driving Flex?

At least for the duration of being in school. It’s a two and a half year program, but I’ll be doing a summer semester also, so I’m looking at least two years from the time I started in October. Could be longer. I’m planning on moving after I get out of school, so it kind of depends on whether where I move to has Flex available as an option.

If you were still driving Flex in 10 years, how would you feel about that?

If I could, that would be great. It’s just excess income. There’s no reason — if I have the time available — that I can’t run out, make a little extra money, that kind of thing. The direction that Flex is headed, and where it’s gonna be in 10 years, is completely different than it is now, but I definitely wouldn’t be opposed to doing it.

There’s a lot of talk about the rise of the gig economy and people having to do lots of different part-time and contract work to make ends meet. Do you think that’s concerning?

Not for me personally. I mean, the only reason it would concern me at all is just because the more people that get involved in the gig economy, the less work there is to be had within it. If we double the amount of drivers, our workload is cut in half. That would be the only concern I had. As far as needing that second income to make ends meet — I don’t do this because I have to, I do this because I want to. There are some people that do this because they have to, because they can’t make ends meet. I’m not one of those people and can’t really speak for those people.

A few months ago you posted a music video to your Facebook page, swapping out the lyrics of Chris Janson’s “Redneck Life” to make it about Flex driving. What’s been the response from other Flex drivers?

Everybody loves it. Everybody think it’s hilarious and that it’s spot on. It went fairly viral in the Flex community. If I had to take a guess, I’d say it’s probably been viewed about 5,000 times, which is a pretty big chunk of the Flexers that are on social media. Everyone was just laughing and having a good time and, like I said, that’s what this community is, that’s what it’s really all about. As far as Flex goes, everyone’s just super friendly. I put it out just make people smile when they can’t catch a block or anything else. At least we can find some humor in it.