Everyone's got a skill

A man who lost his job during the pandemic has found a successful new revenue stream for himself by offering to put together people's flatpack furniture. Waz Mahmood lost his job as a trainee construction site manager in September, and after having previously built Ikea flat packs for people as a way of making extra cash, he decided to advertise his services on the Airtasker app. The app lets users post tasks that they need doing , with other users then able to bid on the jobs and offer their services. Waz first used the app back in 2018 to save up money for a holiday to Ibiza, and managed to raise the funds for the trip in just 30 days. Speaking about how he first found Airtasker, he said: “I actually found Airtasker after searching online for how to make extra money – I was saving for a last minute trip to Ibiza and I had 30 days to make the money – the work I did on Airtasker made that happen!" But this time round it proved much more lucrative for the 31-year old, and he managed to make a living out of the work during the pandemic, taking on hundreds of jobs. According to his profile furniture assembly has "become second nature" to him, and he boasts a perfect 5-star rating on the platform from 202 reviews. He has now found another job as an assistant construction site manager, but still takes on extra jobs to get some more cash in. It's not been without its dramas and mishaps though. He once made a 160-mile round trip to Southampton to build a wardrobe, not realising how far away the city was, and on another occasion his nephew managed to fall through the back of a wardrobe that the two of them had just built. As a result of his many successes though, he's a bit of a big name on the app. ""Now, of course, I'm a well-known name on Airtasker. I've been in the game for a while, so when I bid on a job everyone recognises me," he said. What a great example of spotting a gap in the market. And a brilliant showcase of just how much people hate putting together flatpack Ikea furniture.