Mystery Shopping Thread 25 *PLEASE READ THE OP FIRST**PLEASE NO CLIENT NAMES OR FEES

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sparklysaver wrote: »

Well, yes, it is a loss making assignment. So, what any HMRC auditor is going to ask is; why are you taking it, knowing that to be the case?

Either you're taking it for the "free" meal, in which case I personally would count the total reimbursement as a fee and take my mileage expenses off the £12, or you're taking it to show an on-paper loss to count against profit elsewhere. In which case, you might get lucky and never be audited.

Everyone does it slightly differently I suspect. I count a reimbursement as an expense if it's something minor I've had to buy to earn a decent fee. If the fee is minimal and realistically I'm only taking the job for the reimbursement because it's something I want, then I take the hit and pay tax on the whole thing. Others will no doubt disagree.

Haha thanks that makes sense. Yet again in the wonderful world of Tax, nothing is ever simple/100% one way or another!

So certainly for starter assignments it's going to just essentially be deducting mileage, printing, use of home costs etc from what I can see. So I'll make a profit on every assignment anyway :rotfl:

sparklysaver

Have a look at the HMRC site; there are really good, free courses/webinars for the newly self-employed. Definitely worth a few hours of anyone's time, particularly since the tutors have always been happy to answer questions in my experience.

skivenov

samtastic7 wrote: »

well tonight i do my first shift as a general assistant at a fitness centre. Need to do less merchandising and Mystery shopping as retail is started to annoy me.

Hope it goes well for you, I'm hitting the point where I'm asking myself if I'd rather go and stack shelves a couple of nights a week for my part time.

samtastic7

skivenov wrote: »

Hope it goes well for you, I'm hitting the point where I'm asking myself if I'd rather go and stack shelves a couple of nights a week for my part time.

In fed up dashing about from one place to the next I feel I work more hours than I get paid for

skivenov

I don't mind that bit, it's the reports I'm bored sick of.

Big_Graeme

weeg wrote: »

Then I read the brief and realised that I still value my time and sanity higher than that fee. Who does these?!

:Cough: but there are three scenarios, two are a right royal PITA the third isn't too bad a small purchase, a meal and four interactions, I do them over a lunchtime so the meal is a bonus, anyone who takes two hours over them is shopping not mystery shopping IMO.

PeteW

Anyone get the email form IMS just now asking you to contact a supermarket and ask them to restock a product which they've dropped?

Presumably so the manufacturer gets their product back in stores by faking consumer demand.

Morally questionable to put it lightly, as I intend to tell IMS so. Anyone know how legal this is? It looks distinctly fraudulent to me.

sparklysaver

Morally dubious, yes. Illegal/fraudulent, I can't see how. I'd say it falls somewhere in the middle of a scale; there are record companies handing out signed photos to kids in so-called street teams so they'll bombard radio stations with fake requests at the benign end, and pharmaceutical companies funding patient groups to pressure the NHS and the media about new drugs which NICE have rejected at the deeply immoral end.

If any manufacturer thinks that creating fake demand is a better tactic than just paying the listing fee, then good luck to them. It'll be a temporary listing at best, if the product still doesn't sell.

Also, no, I've not had that email.

skintsocks

Where are the pharmacies then? All I can see is millions and millions and millions (etc) of phones (zzzzz).

Macadamia

PeteW wrote: »

Anyone get the email form IMS just now asking you to contact a supermarket and ask them to restock a product which they've dropped?

Presumably so the manufacturer gets their product back in stores by faking consumer demand.

Morally questionable to put it lightly, as I intend to tell IMS so. Anyone know how legal this is? It looks distinctly fraudulent to me.

I saw the post and had to have a look, although I rarely think they have any work worth doing. I agree its dodgy, doesn't feel legal -I think it's sharp practice.

Here's a dilemma. Supposing you work on a temp contract for the supermarket in question in a relevant department at head office and moonlight as an MS'er.

Obviously you don't touch the IMS job with a barge pole (& for the money who would? You couldn't do 4+ of them an hour and even make the minimum wage.) ....but would any of you be tempted to 'leak?'