4 ms·

I've often wanted the same. The main problem seems to be that it is probably hard to make a living as a personal assistant at the prices you and I are willing t

by rguzman 17y ago

I've often wanted the same. The main problem seems to be that it is probably hard to make a living as a personal assistant at the prices you and I are willing to pay. There is also the trust issue: would you really trust a stranger enough to do sensitive things?

thomaspaine 17y ago
It didn't occur to me that I could hire someone until I saw this: http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/bipan/i_used_to_have_a_personal_assistant_it_was_a_few/ http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/bipan/i_used_to_have_a... It just so happened that the previous day when my girlfriend asked me what I wanted for my birthday, I gave her a list of errands to run, people to call, and forms to fill out. She says I should just pay her instead of hiring someone, since she admittedly does do a lot of this crap for me anyways, but something doesn't feel right about hiring my girlfriend to be my personal assistant. Regarding the business side of things, it might be feasible if you had a central service that could distribute the load of multiple clients among a stable of assistants. You sign up for X hours per week, and you get an assistant on retainer. Maybe you pay a premium if you prefer to work with one person exclusively. Locality could be a problem though, because you would ideally want your assistant to be pretty close to where you work/live.
- mstevens 17y ago
  Related, I've repeatedly seen companies try virtual office services, and abandon them for being awful. A reasonably priced non-awful option therefore sounds good.
petercooper 17y ago
The main problem seems to be that it is probably hard to make a living as a personal assistant at the prices you and I are willing to pay. I'm not sure it's the actual rate of pay. I'd pay $20 an hour for these services no problem, and that's far above minimum wage. The problem is I'd ultimately be paying far more to do all the paperwork, have this person treated as an "employee", taxes, and red tape. If it was just handing cash to someone "under the table" the rate isn't too prohibitive. Labor laws hurt employees as much as they protect them.
- rguzman 17y ago
  Good point! Taking care of taxes and red-tape should be scalable, though, right? Meaning that it should be possible for a company to set all that stuff up and then contract out the people. A consultancy for personal assistants. New question: is there enough demand and margin to make this worth it for a company to do? Is there enough supply of people who want to be personal assistants? My guesses would be no and yes, respectively.

by rguzman 17y ago

thomaspaine 17y ago

It didn't occur to me that I could hire someone until I saw this: http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/bipan/i_used_to_have_a_personal_assistant_it_was_a_few/ http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/bipan/i_used_to_have_a... It just so happened that the previous day when my girlfriend asked me what I wanted for my birthday, I gave her a list of errands to run, people to call, and forms to fill out. She says I should just pay her instead of hiring someone, since she admittedly does do a lot of this crap for me anyways, but something doesn't feel right about hiring my girlfriend to be my personal assistant. Regarding the business side of things, it might be feasible if you had a central service that could distribute the load of multiple clients among a stable of assistants. You sign up for X hours per week, and you get an assistant on retainer. Maybe you pay a premium if you prefer to work with one person exclusively. Locality could be a problem though, because you would ideally want your assistant to be pretty close to where you work/live.

mstevens 17y ago
Related, I've repeatedly seen companies try virtual office services, and abandon them for being awful. A reasonably priced non-awful option therefore sounds good.

petercooper 17y ago

The main problem seems to be that it is probably hard to make a living as a personal assistant at the prices you and I are willing to pay. I'm not sure it's the actual rate of pay. I'd pay $20 an hour for these services no problem, and that's far above minimum wage. The problem is I'd ultimately be paying far more to do all the paperwork, have this person treated as an "employee", taxes, and red tape. If it was just handing cash to someone "under the table" the rate isn't too prohibitive. Labor laws hurt employees as much as they protect them.

rguzman 17y ago
Good point! Taking care of taxes and red-tape should be scalable, though, right? Meaning that it should be possible for a company to set all that stuff up and then contract out the people. A consultancy for personal assistants. New question: is there enough demand and margin to make this worth it for a company to do? Is there enough supply of people who want to be personal assistants? My guesses would be no and yes, respectively.