Reality Check - "Make your own hours"

One thing that they stress in the contract, and build up in their "join our team" glossies, is that "you are running a business and you can make your own hours".

REALITY CHECK. If he doesn't show up when they want him to (just like any other job) he gets questioned by the management there. They'd "like" everyone to be there early. They can't say that everyone MUST be there at 6:30 am because that would be in direct contradiction of the Federal and State definitions of 1099 employees, but they seem to have their way of suggesting things that means "you must do it". His getting there at 7:30 already bothers management. There was a woman who was doing a route because of this very "advertised perk". She got her kids off to school first before showing up and evidently this was perceived as a problem. Evidently they would have "talks" with her about it. She walked and basically told them to shove the route a few months ago.

There is no real reason that anyone has to get there by any particular time. One point stands out pretty clear though, if they are there early, the packages aren't totally sorted yet onto the individual drivers "pallets". From what I can gather it seems an excellent way to have the drivers start doing the sorting (stand at the conveyor, look for your package, run it to your pallet) that they would normally have "pickers" do. And this was not part of any of the "business description or training". This is something they have decided to try and "tack on" recently by suggesting, "hey the packages aren't done being sorted, if you are just standing there why not pitch in" or something to that effect. I know "cost reduction measures" when I smell them.

The drivers are basically paid:

1. to have a vehicle available (its like leasing it to FHD for the day)
2. per stop they make and
3. per package they deliver.

I think of it like this. You take the sum of the 3 above items, subtract the day's expanses and divide it by how long it takes to do the route and you get an estimate of an hourly rate that you can compare to a normal gross- most 1099 hourly contractors I know think in these terms. Any of these "why don't you help us out with this" type of extras that they ask the drivers to do really tick away from their hourly rate and FedEx gets some free labor.

Showing up after the packages are done being sorted means he can scan them, load them and get on his way. Its evidently not a stance that makes you one of the "popular" drivers.