so i guess i’m gonna be a bike courier for a while. i’m working for the first(?)/one of the first bike courier services in the united states.
i had been unemployed for about a month since losing my bike delivery job and have been trying to get a chemistry job. out of the blue my friend contacted me and said he gave me an awesome recomendation and there was a job if i wanted it.
today was my first training day. it sorta sucks i have to “shadow” for like a week, unpaid before i get the job. not to mention how much less i’ll make doing this, but at least i get to bike during the day now, and get a lot of miles in.
This seems to be a little patronizing, like messengers are the only people who know how to ride in the traffic. I could see shadowing for a day just to get the feel of making deliveries and smart routing and all that, but a whole week unpaid?
Who doesn’t show up every day to the first week on the job? Not to be argumentative or anything, I do see what you’re saying. A week unpaid just seems a bit much I guess.
You shadow to gain an understanding of the way postal codes work, where drop offs are, to familiarize yourself with your clients, etc. It has little to do with learning to ride through traffic.
A week…unpaid does seem a little long though.
Side note, I just turned down a job. Part of me just wanted to try it out for a few weeks and see how I enjoyed it.
yeah, riding, in traffic or out of it, is a big part of it but not the biggest part, all the other crap, knowing which buildings have shitty guards or slow elevators, the fastest routes, remembering a string of numbers and names getting spit out your radio at you, blah blah blah. a lot of things that are little, but you have to learn them all.
but a week unpaid? that seems sketch. are they a trustworthy company? a lot of mess companies will try to fuck you hard, any way they can.
[quote=R.J.]You shadow to gain an understanding of the way postal codes work, where drop offs are, to familiarize yourself with your clients, etc. It has little to do with learning to ride through traffic.
A week…unpaid does seem a little long though.
Side note, I just turned down a job. Part of me just wanted to try it out for a few weeks and see how I enjoyed it.[/quote]
Yeah, it is mostly b/c I have routes I need to memorize. Also keeping things straight does seem a bit confusing with all of the pick ups/drop offs. You have to carry a lot at once, not just one pick up at a time, so you are doing several jobs at once. And when I said a week, I think it is more like 3 or 4 days, and only for a few hours a day.
Well, actually I could kinda see it happening. Since you get paid by the package or whatever, I think. Like if a dealership hired a new salesman, and they’re commission only, they might have another salesman kinda show you the ropes while he gets all the commission.
