Mystery Shopping Thread 21 *PLEASE READ THE OP FIRST**PLEASE NO CLIENT NAMES OR FEES*

polythenegirl

jen_br wrote: »

just email it to [EMAIL="becky.dickens@ternconsultancy.co.uk"]becky.dickens@ternconsultancy.co.uk[/EMAIL] she takes care of all HR

Thanks! I've done that

polythenegirl

debsjc wrote: »

I must admit I wouldn't do the betting shop jobs, because I would feel realy self-conscious staying in there for 15 minutes.
I like actually going to the races sometimes, and betting there at the course. Now that would be a nice shopper job :-)

On another note, my moan of the days is overseas call centres. I know companies need to keep costs low but I want to speak to someone I can have a conversation with, and we both understand each other. :mad:

Depends on the company whether it is to do with costs or not. We have an Indian call centre, guys in Japan & in Billerica in the US as well as the main offices in Nottingham. We have customers all over the world and its important to provide coverage for the other countries working hours

N.I.M

I'm inclined to see both sides on the RE Bookies jobs. You should never accept the job and not spend the required amount of time in the store. However if you do leave early be honest and explain your reasons for leaving early (i.e. feeling unsafe). They may accept your report anyway, and if they don't they can get the visit redone fairly. The flipside is that 15 minutes is a RIDICULOUS amount of time to spend in many of the bookies shops for what they want assessing as there are a number which are the size of walk in wardrobes.

N.I.M

Becles wrote: »

In an ideal world they wouldn't know as all the shoppers would be discreet and employees would not have access to the job brief under the guise of MS'ers

You can't do qualitative analysis with random data. It's got to be uniform so you can look for patterns.

I beg to differ, I do quite a bit of qual analysis, particularly from guided discussions and you'll find the guide is regularly strayed from but you can still analyse it. The same theme needs to be looked at but it doesnt matter if the questions are uniformly asked. End of the day they want to see how their employees interact with customers and its bad client side researchers who either couldn't cut it in an agency setting or cant stand up to the board when they know better who influence this kind of uniformity.

Although if they want to do quantitative analysis (like how each area manager is doing on CS compared with the others) then the uniformity is necessary...but there are MUCH better metrics to measure this against.

misssarahleigh wrote: »

So, proofreaders need to go back and read the brief again lol

I've had more issues with proof readers not reading the notes and then coming back for problems with the notes. There was a particular proof reader who is no longer with their company as they knew who shoppers were and this one apparently took a dislike to me as they were disciplined the first time they did one of my reports for not reading the job notes right and I reported them. Got caught hunting through my prior reports and was dismissed for it.

clippy_girl wrote: »

i have given quite a few bad burger reports and not been sacked!

I guess there really is an exception to every rule.

DPJames wrote: »

I've noticed as soon as you give a bad report then it's your abilities that are brought into question rather than the store you've shopped.

I'm fairly sure the insights crowd at this end client have all the spine of a paraplegic mouse and won't give bad data to the board. Therefore they make it difficult for us to give them bad data.

A lot of companies MS to get things like IIP accreditation, its one of the most meaningless awards I've ever seen. Others just MS to tick a box and do nowt with it.

Oooh looks like I got ranty. Sorry all :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Ziggy_Stardust

Oh my goodness me this MS lark does go deep, I never thought of it being used for IIP, guess I've been out of management too long.

N.I.M

IIP requires evidence that the higher ups be doing all they can to improve staff if they are aiming for gold standard and well how better to find out what their staff need to improve on than by asking customers?

Benergy

Thanks for all the tips guys - applying for the companies mentioned in the posts as we speak!

Chas

proshopper wrote: »

I beg to differ. The client wanted you present in the store for 15 minutes; you have not complied with this requirement. How could you have observed activities in the store over 15 minutes if you did not spend this amount of time in the store?

You also submitted the report giving confirmation that the details you had provided were true (including your in/out times). I interpret this as fraud.

It is not up to us be selective about which parts of the briefs we follow: if we take on a job, we are under obligation to complete it in accordance with the brief, or to be completely honest with the mystery shopping company about any deviations from the brief.

Actions such as yours give mystery shoppers a bad name. Representatives of mystery shopping companies read this thread. Would you really want any mystery shopping company to know that you falsified your visit times for no good reason? I just hope that any mystery shopping company that chances upon your comments does not assume that we all have so little disregard for integrity.

Oh to be so perfect!

I'm sure we've all bent the rules a little at some point, I know I certainly have.

In my opinion the only thing marvellousaunt has done differently is to openly admit it!

Brian_Damage

It's not difficult to spend 15 minutes in a betting shop - you can waste plenty of time by sitting at one of the machines - a member of staff will probably ask you if you want a demo of one of the games, so you can spend quite a few minutes on there. Study the horses in the papers around the walls, watch a couple of races, pretend to send a few messages on your phone. Time will fly if you do things correctly... There's no need to cheat..

squeaky1055

GFK and GR pending in my pshycic account for tomorrow.