I believe in building relationships with your schedulers. That makes it easier, knowing someone to contact.
I'll find an "anchor" shop, one that pays enough that alone, it makes a route profitable. I'll e-mail my scheduler, tell her I'm interested, but would need XXXX $ because the shop is 100 miles away from home. After that one shop is locked in, I look for others on the way there or back, or in the same town. USPS, fast food, c-store mystery shop are all usually quick and pretty simple. So say I got $90 for my "anchor shop", and picked up another $100 with 4 or 5 additional shops. That's my mini-route for a day.
I don't live in a "semi-rural" area - - we are wholly rural! Nearest shop is 45 miles away. so I must ALWAYS ask for "distance pay" (aka: bonus money). Fortunately, I live in an area where shoppers are as plentiful as chicken's teeth, so I do often receive the bonus I require.
I have health restraints, so mostly do "mini-routes". I only did two shops today, 45 miles away. One is on the job board at $15, the other at $20. I got $30 for the first one and $40 for the other. I absolutely did NOT tell either scheduler (two separate MSCs) "I'm gonna be next door doing another shop". I MIGHT say "I might be in that general area" or maybe "I'm going in that direction", but I would never ever tell them I'm doing another shop right next door. Because then, as their job is to get the shop done as cheaply as possible, they could come back with, well, you're gonna be there anyway, so there's no bonus available.
If I see a job I'm interested in, and don't know that scheduler, but know another one at the same company, I'll e-mail the scheduler I know and ask them who schedules, or if they can even just forward my e-mail. I don't think I could do that if I hadn't built a relationship with a scheduler.
Oh, how to do that? Easy. Be a great shopper, respond to e-mails, phone calls and texts messages, and always ALWAYS be polite.