I’ve written previously about working the sugar beet harvest, Amazon peak and various campgrounds or RV parks. These are the more traditional methods of ‘workamping’ that many people are aware of but they’re not the only ways to make extra money. There are some internet groups dedicated to helping people find non-traditional ways to support an RVing lifestyle.

Many of these options are more or less telecommuting jobs. They’re geared toward folks without a retirement income yet. They can include jobs such as accounting, proofreading, transcription, website design and teaching. Pretty much any job that does not require a physical presence can be done from virtually anywhere you have a good internet connection. These options are great for someone who still wants to work fulltime but I just don’t need that much extra income each month.

Some people in my situation perform services on the road (RV repair, hair care, pet grooming, massage). I tried in person computer support for a couple of years but discovered that RVers can be a very frugal bunch of people when it comes to computer services. Others sell arts and crafts. Count me out on that one. I’ve never been very artsy or crafty.

Tally ho! I stumbled across something recently that seems to be right up my alley. The website is http://app.usertesting.com

Companies with websites or smartphone/tablet apps are always trying to improve and need a lot of unbiased user input to make decisions. They contact usertesting.com and get testers to perform specific tasks and provide opinions and impressions.

Before I explain further, I need to emphasize that this is NOT a way to get rich or replace a fulltime income. It’s also not very steady work. When I first signed up, I had to create a basic profile and complete an in-house test. They listened to it, graded me, offered suggestions and cleared me to accept live tests. Between signing up and being cleared for actual work took only a couple of days.

So, I signed in to their website and waited for tests to start popping up. At this point, it really helps if you’re a multitasker. It could be hours between tests popping on your page so you don’t want to just sit there staring at the monitor all day long. Your computer will ding when a test pops in. Prepare yourself for a little more frustration here. Each client wants a particular skillset or demographic to check their website or app. You probably won’t qualify for most tests. When you do qualify, accept it quickly since only a limited number of people will get paid for it.

Within a day or 2, I qualified for a test. I completed it and thought I did a fairly good job. According to my dashboard, I had earned $10. They pay to a PayPal account exactly 7 days to the hour after you upload a test. Now, enter more frustration. Your first live test has to be manually graded by someone at usertesting before you can take another test. They were backlogged after my first test and I had to wait nearly 3 weeks before I could take another test. After that, I started qualifying for several tests a week. Depending on how much time you want to spend, you could probably make $50-$100 a week.

Again, this is not going to make you rich but it could pay for dinners out or campground fees without breaking your back or putting in set hours for someone else.

Well, it’s been 7 years since I’ve wandered the aisles of an Amazon fulfillment center during the Christmas rush. I’m at a different location now. The last time was at Campbellsville KY, where the RV park was a short 2 block walk from work. Now I’m working at Murfreesboro TN and staying in an RV park in Smyrna TN. That’s about a 20 minute drive down I 24, usually not too bad but metro Nashville traffic can really get intense. The first few days I used Google Maps and about 6 times per trip I would get a notice about a disabled vehicle.

Is the work any different? Not really. There are a few small differences that I’ve noticed. Here at BNA3 (Amazon slang for Murfreesboro) , they have 2 start of shift briefing locations instead of the 1 at Campbellsville. That means you have to get logged in to your scanner a few minutes early to see which side you’ll be picking and go to the correct briefing/stretching location. They also use walkie talkies extensively. That makes it much easier to get help anywhere in the warehouse but it also means they can’t pipe music out to take our minds off the drudgery of the work.

After a 7 year break, I obviously had questions about my physical abilities. Good news/bad news there. 3 weeks in and I haven’t been bothered by blisters or chafing rashes like the first time. My feet are in fairly good shape. I can still walk after a 10 hour shift without problem. But…… have you ever heard a sportscaster talk about an athlete losing a step late in their career? I know the true meaning of that now. While I can still scoot down the aisle at a pretty quick pace, it’s not quite as fast as it used to be. I got one more surprise – my eyesight. Those scanners have fairly small type so I frequently have to use my reading glasses. I don’t use glasses for distance or own bifocals so I do a lot of flipping the glasses on and off the top of my head.

My attitude has also changed. The first time around I was constantly trying to get the highest numbers possible, strictly an ego thing. This time I’ve come to a couple of realizations. First, no matter how quick I pick, my pick rates will always be limited by the scanner and by the stowers. The scanner tells me where to go and what to pick. If it sends me on a 20 second walk to pick just one item several times an hour, my numbers will be low. The best hour I had at Campbellsville was standing at a bin full of gift cards for the better part of an hour, picking 10 or 20 at a time without moving. Stowers are the people who put merchandise in the bins for me to pick. If they jam a bin with many similar items, I have to spend extra time pawing through the entire bin for the one item I need. Beyond those 2 limitations, it simply doesn’t make sense for me to kill myself trying to get high numbers. I get paid the same regardless of my pick rate. As long as I meet Amazon standards, I keep getting paid. They also print out reports of all the pickers rates and hang those on a board for review. There are still many pickers with lower numbers than me so I feel fairly secure in my job.

Right now, I have 4 work weeks left. At least 2 of those will be 50 hour weeks. I’ve done one 50 hour week so far but the extra day was in the middle of my 3 day weekend. Future overtime will be 5 days in a row so I’ll be a very tired puppy by the end of the week. The permanent employees refer to a workday as 4 quarters, marked by 2 breaks and lunch. After talking to some coworkers, it seems like many of us are surviving from one quarter to the next. With my first pick of the day, I start counting down to the first break, then to lunch, then to the afternoon break. Maybe they need to figure out a way to get that music in the warehouse to get our minds off that.

My last scheduled shift is 12/21. I’ll take a few days off and tow the 5th wheel down to MS for the winter.

For the second time in as many months, I’m truly grateful that I maintained my YMCA membership instead of cancelling when I left Sequim WA. I’ve visited the Y at every location since I left Sequim but it didn’t seem quite so vital as recently. Last month the hot tub and sauna were used as often as possible during the cold weather snaps at the sugar beet harvest, This month I started at Amazon. I’m a picker again, which involves miles of walking on concrete every day. I just finished my first full week and feel better than expected. But, these next 3 days off will certainly find me at the local YMCA, in the whirlpool, letting those hot water jets work their magic on my feet.

It is now October 31st and I’ve officially finished my last shift at the Sabin MN piling station. It’s been a very trying month, with lots of downtime due to weather. The actual work hasn’t been too bad although there were a few times we got slammed as farmers tried to play catch up. I was slightly surprised at the number of people who left early, or hired on late and only lasted a few days. These were mostly local people, not the RVers. We’ve had short shifts the last couple of days and that came in handy to prep the RV for travel again. Looks like I’ve done OK financially although I won’t have final numbers until my last check in about a week. At this point, I’m really looking forward to hitching up in the morning and heading south to get out of these frigid temps.