Ho,
I'm just beginning to use contracts for the Aldrat Trade Project, but I've encounterd the first bottleneck ... the reward for the individual courier contract. Due to limited funds for the project I can only buy smaller numbers of goods in different places (where they are cheaper), say 1.000 m³ in Dodixie and 1.500 m³ in Rens. Now this goods are to big for my fast sneaky blockade runner Venture (:lol:) and I don't have an ooc alt. On the other hand a fair few unistas have these alts or suitable ships to haul these goods.
So we can do this together: I provide a smallish courier contract and the other unistas has some cargohold left in his ship. So if he's in Rens anyway, he can pick up the contract for some extra ISK. I don't expect that someone flies to Rens and back to Aldrat for my contract alone.
The cruical point is the reward. The mentioned standard rate is way to high for such small contracts ... 10 jumps from Rens to Aldrat would amount to a minimum of 2.000.000 ISK. Ok for higher volumes (and hence more profit), but not possible for ATP stuff. ATP uses Hek prices, so the profit per items is limited.
SolutionThe
collateral based reward. Again ... shamelessly plagiarized from one of Paul Umwelts ideas. I did a few calculations and settled at a rate of
0,5% collateral per jump
as the standard reward. I know that Paul is much more generous with his rates. ^^ But remember, only a small amount of cargohold is needed and it should work on a "pick up if convenient and flying that route anyway"-base. If you combine it with other courier contracts or your own hauling needs, you can make a nice profit (at least from a newer players point of view).
Another nice effect: the more valuable the cargo (and collateral) and therefore the risk is, the higher is the reward.
The rate of 0,5% seems (and maybe even is) quite low. But keep in mind that every jump lowers the profit and there is no "economy of scale" in place since the cargo volume is so low. I simply can't afford to buy 8000m³ of rigs at one time in the same hub and ship it to Aldrat for a flat rate of 200.000 ISK per jump. Nor will the ATP create huge profits ... think of a corridor between 10% and 25%. Every jump equals 0,5 percentage point of your profit. After 10 jumps that amounts to 5% of your profit, acceptable if you can realise 25% profit, but hard if your profit before hauling costs is 10%.
ExampleLets say I have a contract package of 1.000 m³ at Rens and need someone to haul it 10 jumps to Aldrat. The collateral is 11.000.000 ISK.
11.000.000 ISK x 0,5% = 55.000 ISK per jump
10 jumps x 55.000 ISK =
550.000 ISK reward for the courier contract
Another example: 8.000 m³ at Rens, 10 jumps to Aldrat, collateral at 88.000.000 ISK.
88.000.000 ISK x 0,5% = 440.000 ISK per jump
10 jumps x 440.000 ISK =
6.600.000 ISK reward for the courier contract
What do you think about his solution?
- Henko