Should I Take Every Delivery Order?

Determine your minimum hourly rate before you go online

Before you evaluate individual orders, decide what an hour of gig work needs to produce for you. Your target should reflect more than the amount shown in the app. Consider your operating costs, taxes, unpaid waiting time, and the income you need from gig work.

Start with a gross hourly target, then compare it with an estimated net hourly rate after costs. A delivery can pay well per mile but still fall short if it takes too long, has a long restaurant wait, or leaves you far from the next busy area.

Look beyond the offer payout

The amount shown in the app is gross pay. It does not automatically account for the full trip, your time, or the costs of using your vehicle. Consider these factors before accepting:

• Total miles: Include pickup distance, delivery distance, and likely repositioning miles after drop-off.
• Total time: Include driving, restaurant wait time, traffic, parking, and apartment or gate delays.
• Vehicle costs: Gas, maintenance, tires, insurance, repairs, and depreciation can reduce what an order is worth to your business.
• Taxes: Gig income may require estimated tax payments, so some of each payment may need to be set aside instead of spent.
• Your next opportunity: An order that ends far from demand can create unpaid repositioning time before the next offer.

Estimate the order's hourly pace

A quick first check is to compare the offer payout with the total time you expect the trip to take.

For example, imagine a $9.00 delivery that takes 30 minutes from acceptance through drop-off:

That $18.00 is a gross pace, not your take-home pay. Your personal operating-cost estimate and tax reserve can reduce the amount that is actually available to spend or save.

Use all miles, not just delivery miles

A common mistake is evaluating an offer only by the distance between the restaurant and the customer. The full trip may also include miles to the restaurant and miles needed to return to a busy area.

Track business miles consistently. For tax purposes, the IRS generally requires records that support business vehicle use. The standard mileage method is a tax-deduction method; it is not a universal estimate of your exact cash cost for every delivery.

Build a personal accept-or-decline filter

Your filter does not need to be complicated. Before accepting, ask whether the order is likely to meet your personal standards for payout, total miles, total time, and ending location.

The right threshold depends on your market, vehicle, platform, demand, incentive programs, traffic, and financial goals. Avoid treating someone else's rule as a universal answer. A strategy that works in a dense city during peak demand may not fit a suburban or rural market.

Review your full shift, not only one order

One imperfect order does not always make a shift unprofitable. Instead, review your work over a full shift or week: gross pay, miles, online time, active time, vehicle costs, and the money you need to reserve for taxes.

An order does not need to be perfect to be worth taking. But if it repeatedly falls below your personal hourly-rate target after miles, time, costs, and taxes, it may be adding activity without adding meaningful income.