Sharing a delivery driver?

Hi

A buddy of mine runs a Mexican restaurant 4mins from my shop and he wants to expand into doing a bit of delivery. He knows I already have a delivery driver and asked me if I could share my driver with him. Usually, the driver helps out in the kitchen on slow days. Is sharing a driver with another shop a good idea? At the moment, I’m paying the driver $7/hr plus $1/delivery. He thinks he can pay me back by the miles travelled at $1/mi (round trip) + $1/delivery. If your shop wasn’t too busy, would you share yours?

Are you carrying any insurance on your delivery driver?
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

I would stay away from that deal. What happens if you both are busy? What happens if the driver is in an accident while delivering for him?

Daddio and I are on the same wave length, hence my question about insurance.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

No, I’m not. He drives his own car.

To your second question, because it’s his car and his insurance, I’m not sure if it matters if the accident happens while delivering for him?

He’s only experimenting with deliveries, so I was going to just offer him Sunday to Thurs.

If he drives his vehicle for you, it is in your best interest to have insurance for non owned vehicles, to cover your butt. You could be in big trouble if he injures of kills someone while he is driving for you.

Search the topic of insurance here on the thinktank it will open your eyes to what you need. Here is an example:

Ours was cancelled a couple of years ago and it took us 6 months to get it replaced. We could get instant coverage for 100k a year or wait and get it for 30k. Being that we never had a claim so we rolled the dice and waited. Sure enough we had a driver use his moms car, get in an accident and his insurance denied his claim. The other guy sued me and I had to settle it out myself. All in all it cost me the same but did make for some sleepless nights being the attorney was trying to shake me down for 250k. I’m at the point where I’ll pay for the insurance and sleep at night.

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Anyone know of a company / service provider that would allow several restuarant owners to “band together” with the objective of having many drivers and being able to reduce /share costs…Be our “own” 3rd party delivery … thanks

We are thinking to make a group of casual drivers
And ask them if it get busy and pay them for each delivery.
Beacuse usually our drivers work in the store but its only when delivery get extreme busy.

Have you thought about setting up a separate company for this?

Before I opened my shop I had a company that did deliveries for a number of the local restaurants, pharmacies and flower shops. I charged a flat rate delivery fee and the drivers were paid as subcontractors.

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yes I am leaning in that direction, if anyone has “numbers” on what an operation like this might cost / produce and also how / if delicate insurance and legal liability would be for this service…Thank you