Same here. :) Have a Fiverr I've been planning on offering some sort of installation/hosting related services for a long time now, but do have a regular job right now so personally it's no real priority. Feels like it could be a lucrative side-hustle if only you really structure things right though. Have message templates when you start/finish your jobs for example, saving up on time where you can, ten dollars for an installation that'd take maybe 10-15 minutes wouldn't be bad at all... anyway as for freelancer yeah, I feel ya, did some translations and odd jobs there too but it didn't really pay the bills, possibly it gets better the more of a resume you get though, or if you just keep bidding on the right projects and find people who care more about quality than price. I think competition's just going to get tougher and tougher though. :) You can usually build a visible list of merits just by bidding ridiculously low on some simple projects for starters; getting some reviews. In theory. Ideal would be to make it on your own of course, put up a professional-looking portfolio/skills and start contacting suitable companies...
Ah, interesting. Maybe the advice I'm giving is a bit skewed then. Personally I feel I'm more inclined to commission someone if I can see their price right away, and not need to ask them (and if the price is affordable, of course), but if you reach a level where you have a certain level of game that brings people to YOU then it does seem wiser to keep prices adaptable... being able to raise them according to demand too. Anyway I guess I'll shoot a PM this time then; see what those numbers might be...
Cyberdevil
Sounds like a tough life situation right now man. :/ Hope you get the freelance thing figured out. A plus side with that kind of work is that you really don't need any local presence, you should be able to do all sorts of work without moving an inch, sites like freelancer.com or odesk.com usually have a surplus of jobs but the competition's tough too. A lot of low-wage workers. Maybe fiverr.com is a slightly better newcomer alternative if only you get into a good niche there. Something that doesn't take long to accomplish, so even low prices = bigger income.
Regarding retail, I imagine there's an abundance of people looking for those jobs too right now, at least here a crazy amount of people are losing their jobs in more socially oriented businesses, restaurants etc... even if they're desperate there's probably heavy competition there too.
Hope you find your thing! Comissions hmm, do you have any price list/samples on those? Always good to have to get in new clients too.
Dingalow
That's a good idea, I do have a Fiverr account but never really bigged it up or anything. I tried Freelancer years ago without much success but I've improved a lot since then. And yeah the situation for workers is pretty rough here in the UK. Even before the virus it was pretty damn hard to get work, despite having a degree, pretty much every job opening requires a bullshit amount of experience, even for shitty part-time work. You'd think they'd be less picky at this point but apparently not lmao.
I was always told not to have a price list up, and to instead discuss it with clients. I have an excel sheet with starting prices that I can use to make a price list, though