It's Official - New Doordash Pay Model is Complete

The new Doordash pay model is complete, and all dashers should now be under the new payment structure. I must say that I was one of the last ones for the change to occur. Many dashers in my area were already were under the new pay model for days. It finally happened though, and I was excited that I too was now under the new pay model and would actually now begin to receive the actual tips from customers. Later that same day I received an email from Doordash that the new pay model has been completed. Sure, I was one of the last ones, but it was finally here!

How has the new Doordash pay model been so far?

It has been a couple of days now since I have been dashing under the new pay model. What have the results been so far? Well, I'll tell you this. Nothing has surprised me at all. I am now making much more money than I was under the old rip-off stealing tips model. Yes, when I receive the tip money that customers intend to go to me I am making much more money than if Doordash subsidized the customer's tip into a guarantee.

How much are Doordash calls paying under the new pay model?

Under the old pay model 99 percent of calls paid between $5.50 and $9.00. Every once in a while a dasher would receive a $10 or higher call or receive what Doordash called an over-guarantee. With $5.50 being the minimum, many dashers were happy that they would not ever receive anything lower than that. Like I said though, there was not many well paying calls either. Everything was basically in the range I mentioned.

With the new pay model in effect, dashers are now seeing very well paying offers pop up on their phone that they would have never seen under the old pay model. The reasoning here is that dashers are now actually receiving their customer's tips. Let me share an example from my last 30 deliveries. Three of my deliveries paid between $15 and $20. There have been 11 calls between $10 and $14.99.  There has also been another 11 calls between $8 and $9.99. The other five calls have been between $6 and $7.99.




The tip money that customers add for their dasher really makes a big difference. For many calls, the base pay that Doordash now pays is $5, $6, $7 or more. When the customer adds a nice $5 to $10 tip on top of that dashers are receiving very good earnings for their work. Even if customers only add in a small $2 tip to their order, chances are that dashers are going to receive a decent offer for the delivery. For example, if Doordash is going to pay $5 base pay and the customer tips $2; dashers will receive a decent offer of $7 to make the delivery.

With all of that said, with the new pay model in effect, there is no longer a $5.50 minimum guarantee for drivers. That means that sometimes dashers are receiving offers of $2, $3, $4 or $5 to complete a delivery. Generally, these offers are coming from customers that are not tipping anything for their driver. Non-tippers are not hidden anymore and are easily exposed by the low pay outs that drivers are offered.

Every Doordash driver out there must decide for themselves if they will be accepting these low paying offers or not. Personally, I would never take these low paying offers. The lowest payment that I would take for a delivery is $6. That is just me though, I have heard that some dashers were really busy out there delivering a bunch of $2 and $3 offers. To each their own strategy! The only reason that I can see myself possibly doing one of these offers is if it's real late, time for me to go home, and I receive a call that is in route to go home.

The new Doordash pay model is great

What this all comes down to is making money, and with the new Doordash pay model that is exactly what is happening. About a month ago I ran a little experiment with the calls that I was receiving. It showed what I actually received under the tip-stealing pay model and what I would have received if I had actually received my tips. It was easy to prove that dashers are better off when they receive customer tips.

I didn't need this experiment to prove to myself that us dashers were getting ripped off. I always knew it. I just wanted to show it to some dashers out there that thought for some reason that dashers were better off with Doordash stealing our tips for the sake of having a $5.50 minimum. Sure, some dashers out there will complain about all of the low $2 and $3 offers without even having a strategy. Chances are that these people have not ever used multiple platforms at the same time. Why do I say this? Because usually those that are strategic in this business use multiple platforms.

If anybody wants to earn good money delivering food, this business is all about strategy, and if somebody has not given much thought to their strategy, they are most likely not going to do very well. With Doordash changing their pay model and allowing drivers to keep their tip money, I had to come up with a new strategy. Yes, running multiple apps is part of my strategy, but you do have to be careful and learn to do that correctly or else you will end up in a big mess. Besides running multiple apps, there are other strategies that drivers can come up with if they put on that good old thinking hat.

 

I will end this by saying that I am so glad that we are finally receiving our tips. Thank you for that Doordash. Sure, Doordash had to have its arm twisted behind its back to make the move, but it has finally been done. So far this new pay model seems better than the really old school pay model of $5 plus customer tip per delivery. For many of my calls the base pay is much more than $5. This new Doordash pay model is the best thing that ever happened for dashers!