Paula Gibbins | Page 3 of 8

by Paula Gibbins on August 23, 2019 Leave a Comment

The Best Ways to Boost Your Rideshare Driver Earnings

It happens to all rideshare drivers sooner or later: everything is going well, you’re staying busy, and then BOOM! No requests. Whether it lasts half an hour or longer depends on where you live, but during times like this, there are still ways to make money while on the road. RSG contributor Paula Gibbins shares the best ways to boost your rideshare driver earnings below.

The whole point of driving for Uber or Lyft or any other service is to make money. And the best way to make money is to be sure to drive when demand is high and you’re able to stay busy. I’ve written before about how you can maximize your earnings while driving part time, but what if you’re a full time driver or a driver who wants to have a more flexible schedule (no 9 to 5)?

This is where knowing a few good tips and tricks come in, from both part time and full time drivers. And in addition to the tips I’ll outline below on how to maximize your time on the road, you may also want to consider signing up for another rideshare company, like HopSkipDrive. As you’ll see, they actually pay more than Uber and Lyft and their busy times line up well with when Uber and Lyft are slow. So you can work for both and make more!

Want More Tips? Deliver With DoorDash

Dashers receive tips on 97% of their deliveries. DoorDash has a tip button and encourages customers to setup "automatic" tips. Become a dasher here.

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by Paula Gibbins on August 7, 2019 Leave a Comment

Why is Lyft Blocking Third Party Apps like Mystro?

Over the past few months, Lyft has been actively blocking Mystro – an app that we’re a big fan of (Harry is even an advisor to Mystro) and many drivers have e-mailed us to express their frustrations. Today, RSG contributor Paula Gibbins looks into what’s going on and what you can do about it if you use third party apps for rideshare driving.

Lyft and Uber boast safety as one of their top priorities, but one has to wonder if that’s really the case when a rideshare company like Lyft blocks third party apps that help with driver safety. As many of you know, Mystro is an app that allows drivers to drive for both Uber and Lyft hands free and today we’ll look at what’s been going on between Lyft and Mystro and how it might affect you as a driver going forward.

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by Paula Gibbins on July 31, 2019 Leave a Comment

How to Handle an UberX Delivery Request

As drivers, we’re asked to deliver all sorts of interesting people to and from destinations. But have you ever been asked (by your Uber app) to deliver an item and not a person? In some markets, UberX drivers are now seeing requests to pick up and deliver items. RSG contributor Paula Gibbins outlines what to look out for and how to handle an UberX delivery request.

If you’ve been driving for a while, you know how to handle passengers (and maybe Uber Eats, if you drive for both!). But do you know what to do when a request for delivering an item to a person comes through?

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by Paula Gibbins on July 22, 2019 Leave a Comment

The 3 Best Ways to Increase Your Tips – and 6 Ways That DON’T Work

One of the best ways to increase how much money you bring in everyday as a driver is to increase your tips. But getting people to tip isn’t as easy as it sounds. RSG contributor Paula Gibbins breaks down some new research showing what strategies work the best to increase tips – and which ones don’t work as well!

Everyone wants to make more money as an Uber/Lyft driver, and while you can’t control the rates Uber and Lyft set, you can strive to earn more through tips. And luckily for drivers, Uber and Lyft let us keep 100% of our tips, meaning every extra dollar you make in tips is going straight into your pocket. But are there any surefire ways of making those tips?

Fortunately, I got hold of a recent survey from a brand called Trinova, that offers home and automotive cleaning products, and they asked some great questions to see what works when it comes to getting tips and what doesn’t. Now normally, I don’t share stuff like this from random companies on the internet that e-mail me, but I think their questions were well thought out and the data will be useful for all of you.

So here are the top 3 tips for earning more tips as discovered by their survey of 500 part-time and full-time drivers.

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by Paula Gibbins on July 16, 2019 60 Comments

Do Rideshare Drivers Need To Get Business Licenses?

In this Throwback Tuesday Classic, RSG contributor Paula Gibbins answers a question many drivers are worried about: do we need business licenses to drive with Uber and Lyft? Many LA Uber drivers recently received a notice from Uber stating they need a business license to operate in the city, which came as a surprise to many drivers. This isn’t the first time this has happened to rideshare drivers. Here’s what all drivers should know about business licenses and rideshare driving.

Update: Since SB 182 passed in California, California drivers now only need one business license to work statewide. Drivers can obtain this business license in the city where they live.

The Case Of San Francisco

The actual language of the letter drivers in SF received was “if you drive on San Francisco streets seven days or more a year and work as an independent contractor rather than an employee of your TNC, you are required to obtain a Business Registration Certificate.” It gave me 30 days to either register for “both the current registration period and the 2016-2017 registration period.”

Or I could to go to a different website and declare I do not need to register. Now, it gives you 15 days from starting business to submit your registration.

For those of you who are interested, here is the full letter that drivers received from the SF Office of the Treasurer & Tax Collector, along with the response that Uber and Lyft gave to drivers:

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