I Became A Rapido Driver. Won't Be Doing It Again

If you know me, you know I love experiments.

And I love money.

And I love experiments that make me money.

So when someone told me I could get paid just to drive around, I jumped at the chance. But this one is a loser.

Let’s dive a bit deeper.

Nowadays you can get paid to do just about anything.

From tweeting about “pop goss” to uploading your feet pics online (Honest to god, have not tried this one…..yet)

Becoming a cab driver lies somewhere in the middle of this weird spectrum of online money-making.

It requires medium effort, pay scale remains medium, and opportunities for growth are slim.

Also in India, it requires you to register your vehicle as a commercial transport vehicle. Unless you’re enrolled with Rapido. Which is what I did.

I use Rapido to go to my office on the daily. It’s cheap, it’s fast, and it' gets me drivers who don’t chat as much.

Occasionally, however, a conversation or two happens. And when that does, interesting insights appear.

Once such conversation with a Rapido “Captain“ during my regular trip to the office was how easy it is to register and start earning on Rapido.

“I make 20-30k a month on this, brother“ is what this guy told me.

The numbers did not make sense so I dug deeper. It is disheartening.

To make 30k INR a month, this guy has to:

• Complete 10-15 rides each day

• 20-25 minutes per ride, 250 minutes a day (~6 hours)

• Average an order value of 70 INR, else it does not make sense

• Repeat that for 30 days, no days off

The only problem? This does not account for fuel charges. Let’s revise the math again.

The Math

Petrol rates in Chennai: 100.75 INR

Average bike mileage in Chennai: 35km

Average ride distance, if you want to make 70 INR: 7km

This means that for every 5 rides, our captain has to spend 100 INR

So from the 15 rides he takes a day, he’ll make 1050 INR, and he will spend 300 INR.

But he’s been out for six hours. What about lunch? Take another 100 INR off for that.

So the net revenue per day would be 650 INR.

I call net revenue and NOT profit, because there’s opportunity costs that need to be calculated.

For six hours. That amounts to ~108 INR per hour.

How do I know this math? Because I wore the captain’s helmet.

I took an order while coming back from work, towards home. It does not work

Becoming a Rapido Captain should be your last resort - if all you have are skills that will not pay you above 108 INR per hour.

Here’s a list of jobs that pay you much better than being a Rapido Captain, with more or less the same effort, if you’re a complete beginner:

• Social media assistant: $15/hour

• Ghost Writer: $50-$150/piece

• Blog Writer: $15-$20

• Creative Designing: $35-$50/hour

• Virtual Assistant: $15-$25/hour

And so many more. But the reason Rapido Captains seem like an attractive opportunity is because of the minimal overhead effort that you need to capture new customers

Is it worth that initial effort though? Most definitely.

How much I made from my little Rapido experiment? 50 INR :)

Enough to pay my fuel cost back home.

Like this post? Let me know by replying to this one :)