Estimate for depot managers
Courier rate per drop calculator
A courier rate per drop is the amount you pay for a completed delivery on a multi-drop round. It is not the driver's wage until you subtract miles, insurance and time. This calculator uses the drops, days, rate, fuel or energy, van costs and hours you enter, and labels every result as an estimate.
Your round
Every result is an estimate from these inputs. Nothing is stored in Zerity. Change any figure. The starting numbers match the worked example further down the page.
What you pay when the delivery is completed. Uncompleted drops should not be included in the count above.
Type the running cost you already use for fuel or home charging. This tool has no national fuel price.
Finance, tyres and maintenance, if you want them in the sum. Use 0 to leave them out.
Include loading at the depot if the driver is not paid separately for that time.
Estimate
A month here is 52 weeks divided by 12. It is not a four-week month.
You pay per week
£440.00
Before the driver's miles, insurance and van costs
Driver keeps per week
£300.00
Gross pay minus the costs you entered
Cost per drop
£0.35
Running costs spread across completed drops
Breakdown
- Completed drops in the week
- 400
- Gross pay per month
- £1,906.67
- Running costs per week
- £140.00
- Running costs per month
- £606.67
- Driver keeps per month
- £1,300.00
- Left per completed drop, after costs
- £0.75
- Kept per hour on the hours you entered
- £7.50
Email this estimate
Optional. This opens your email app with the figures. Zerity does not store the address or the breakdown.
What a rate per drop includes
The rate per drop is the amount the depot pays for one completed delivery. It is gross. It becomes closer to earnings only after you subtract the miles, the insurance and the time the round takes. Uncompleted parcels, reattempts you do not pay, and depot loading that is outside the rate all change the hourly result. Use this when you set the rate. It is not a promise of what a driver will take home.
The sum
Weekly gross equals completed drops per day, times days, times the rate per drop. Weekly running cost equals miles per day, times days, times pence per mile, divided by 100, plus insurance per day times days, plus other van costs per day times days. The amount the driver keeps equals weekly gross minus weekly running cost. Cost per drop equals weekly running cost divided by weekly drops. Kept per hour equals the amount kept divided by hours per day times days. Monthly figures multiply the weekly figure by 52 and divide by 12.
Pence per mile is your fuel or electricity figure. There is no AA, RAC or DESNZ price baked in, because those prices move and this tool should not pretend they are current. Assumptions were last reviewed on 25 September 2026, and they are still only the numbers you type.
From April 2026 the National Living Wage for workers aged 21 and over is £12.71 an hour. The kept-per-hour line is not a wage compliance test. Self-employed couriers are not employees, and GOV.UK says the employment steps on that guide are for employees. Use the figure as context beside your own costs.
Parcel rounds versus same-day per-mile jobs
A multi-drop parcel round pays for each completed delivery. Same-day work is usually a job rate or a mileage rate, often with a minimum that has to cover waiting. Do not mix the two. Dividing a same-day minimum by a guessed number of drops does not produce a parcel rate, and it should not be compared with the BBC's 35p figure below.
Worked example
Every figure in this example is marked example. They are the calculator's starting values, not a survey and not a Zerity benchmark.
- Example: 80 completed drops a day, 5 days, £1.10 per completed drop.
- Example: 70 miles a day at 20 pence per mile. That 20p is an input, not a fuel index.
- Example: £6 insurance a day, £8 other van costs a day, 8 hours a day.
Example result: 400 drops in the week, £440 gross, £70 fuel or energy, £30 insurance, £40 other van costs. The driver keeps £300 in the week and £1,300 in a 52/12 month. Cost per drop is £0.35. Left after costs is £0.75 per drop, or £7.50 per hour on the 40 hours entered. Replace any line that is not your round.
There is no national rate
On 15 December 2025 the BBC reported: "Rates vary, but Evri pays couriers as little as 35p to deliver one." The same article says couriers are paid when the parcel is delivered, and that Evri told the BBC average courier earnings exceeded £20 an hour. The BBC page also notes a libel claim by Evri about the Panorama broadcast. The 35p line is a reported small-packet rate, not a rate you should copy onto an Amazon DSP round. The article quoted a National Minimum Wage of £12.21, which GOV.UK lists as the April 2025 to March 2026 rate for ages 21 and over.
Service Club's pay guide says the hourly result follows drops per hour: a block of flats is not a village. Their regional bands are their own compilation. Read them on that guide.
What the depot files after the rate is agreed
Once the rate is agreed, file the commercial terms and the evidence you will need on pay day. If both you and the driver, or their company, are VAT registered, HMRC's self-billing arrangements require a signed agreement before you raise a VAT invoice in their name. Store the Unique Taxpayer Reference and VAT status only where they have given them to you. This calculator does not work out VAT. Keep the insurance certificate and its expiry with the driver file.
Zerity stores that agreement and produces the self-bill from completed work. See self-billing agreement software, subcontractor driver management software, and HMRC self-billing for couriers. Earnings context, with sources on each figure, is in courier driver earnings in the UK. What a leaver costs the depot is a different sum: courier driver retention and the £6 per active driver price.
Questions
What is a typical UK rate per drop?
There is no national rate. The BBC reported in December 2025 that Evri pays as little as 35p for a small packet, and only when the parcel is delivered; Evri told the BBC that average earnings exceeded £20 an hour, and your own round's density changes the result, so type your own numbers.
Why do two drivers on the same rate earn different amounts?
Drops per hour. A block of flats is not a village. Service Club's pay guide makes that point from route density, and it matches what depots see.
Does this calculator set Amazon DSP pay?
No. DSP pay is whatever you agree with the driver. The calculator only shows whether that rate covers the round once you subtract the miles, insurance and van costs you entered.
Is same-day work priced per drop?
Usually per job or per mile, with a minimum. Use a different line for that work. Do not divide a minimum charge by a guess and call it a parcel rate.