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Food Courier Billable Capacity Estimator

This estimator converts a food courier’s available work schedule into realistic billable delivery capacity. It starts with scheduled hours, removes time that is typically unavailable for paid delivery work, and then translates the remaining time into weekly and annual capacity. It is useful when comparing app schedules, setting an earnings target, or deciding how many delivery blocks can reasonably fit around other commitments. The result is not a promise of demand: order volume, traffic, restaurant wait times, and app access can all reduce the hours that actually produce paid work. Use the estimate as a planning ceiling and compare it with your own recent delivery history before committing to an income goal.

Courier schedule

hr
%
weeks
hr
Result
—
Estimated billable hours per week
Annual billable hours—
Estimated deliveries per week—
Estimated deliveries per year—

1. Set your scheduled time
Enter the total hours you plan to be logged in or available for courier work during a typical week.

2. Allow for non-billable time
Enter the share of scheduled time you expect to lose to repositioning, waiting without pay, breaks, or other unavailable periods.

3. Choose your working year
Enter the number of weeks you expect to work during the year after vacations and planned time off.

4. Estimate delivery duration
Use your typical end-to-end time per completed delivery, including the portions you consider part of paid work.

5. Review capacity
Use weekly billable hours as the main planning figure, then compare the estimated delivery counts with your real app history.

Formula:

Weekly billable hours = Scheduled hours × (1 − Unavailable time % ÷ 100) Annual billable hours = Weekly billable hours × Working weeks Estimated deliveries = Billable hours ÷ Average hours per delivery

Scheduled hours are hours per week, unavailable time is a percentage, working weeks are weeks per year, and average delivery time is hours per completed delivery. The model assumes the unavailable share is reasonably stable across the period.

What the result means

The main result is the portion of your weekly schedule that could plausibly support paid delivery work after the time allowance you entered.

Actual courier demand and app conditions can make realized billable time lower than this planning estimate.

Given: 32 scheduled hours per week, 22% unavailable time, 46 working weeks, and 0.55 hour per delivery.

Calculation: Weekly billable hours = 32 × (1 − 0.22) = 24.96 hours. Annual billable hours = 24.96 × 46 = 1,148.16 hours. Estimated weekly deliveries = 24.96 ÷ 0.55 = 45.38.

Result: About 25.0 billable hours and 45.4 deliveries per week, or about 1,148 billable hours per year.

This is a capacity estimate, not a demand forecast.

What counts as unavailable time?

Include scheduled time that is unlikely to produce paid courier work, such as unpaid waiting, repositioning, breaks, or other downtime you want excluded from capacity.

Should I enter online time or active delivery time?

Use the broader weekly schedule you are planning, then let the unavailable-time percentage remove the portion you do not expect to be billable.

Why can estimated deliveries differ from my app totals?

Delivery duration varies by distance, restaurant delays, batching, and market conditions. Replace the default duration with your own recent average for a more useful estimate.

Can I use this for multiple delivery apps?

Yes. Combine the hours only if the schedules do not overlap, and use a blended unavailable percentage and delivery duration that reflect the mix.

How should I use annual billable hours?

Annual billable hours can be paired with a target hourly earnings figure to stress-test an annual income goal, while still leaving room for non-billable time.