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

Nebulous2

I took a drop in pay and responsibility to do a job I really like. It also means working fewer hours than I'm used to. So I top that up with some mystery shopping.

I'm not sure there are enough people around here to provide full- time mystery shopping, but then again maybe I could register with more companies.

That's not what I'm looking for though, some extra money is my main reason for doing it.

naarestrup

I basically do this full time, but then I am also multilingual and do mystery shopping in several countries. This month I've had several well paid, longer routes to only do 2-3 visits in a day as they were in locations they had problems getting covered.
I also have some regular projects I work on such as some electronics audits as well as some audit work for HP and for a large producer of shipping equipment.
I have a steady income, I decide my own hours, I get to travel as lot - and see some sights along the way, so I don't complain too much.

Miss_Terry_Shopper

I think the potential earnings doing mystery shopping depend upon two factors; location, and strategy.

In respect of location: I live in a fairly sparsely populated rural area with the nearest (small) town some twelve miles away. Local jobs are few and far between, and well-paid local jobs are as rare as hens teeth. However, by the same measure, it seems that Mystery Shoppers are also thin on the ground and I try to use this to my advantage.

My strategy has two dimensions. The first involves pro-actively searching for jobs on a wider (regional) basis and, if I find one with a juicy fee, I will scoop-up another half dozen jobs that pay anything half-decent in the same area.

The second involves boycotting any jobs that pay peanuts on the basis that, in my sparsely populated area, some of the jobs will eventually become urgent enough to attract a premium. Then, if I get a call from a "completion co-ordinator", I use my negotiating skills to ensure they pay a decent fee AND decent mileage rates.

As a consequence of being very choosy, I only do MSing for four or five days a month but earn much more than I would if I worked full time doing Fastest-Finger-First jobs for a pittance.

I will never get rich but: its a nice bit of jam on the bread; it gets me out; and, it can be very interesting at the same time.

Larac

Personally I do MS work to make up for the shortfall in the bonus element of my FT salary. As since the recession the corporate I work for, always manages to find some reason for not paying the fulll monty. As they are company wide financial targets, one has little or no control over them.

I like the flexibility of being able to dip in an out of MS work. I won't do any of the jobs with 'cr*p fees' which is MF and RA terrority and try to reach a minimum monthly target. (Have done them but not worth it time or effort', ok for a learning experience) I do travel if I can string aload of reasonable priced jobs together. Location wise I live in a semi rural location, so good for picking up the various stamp shop jobs, local convenience stores and various other random stores that come up over the year. It is all rather unpredictable as some months can be really busy and other times its a bit slow, and you never know what strange jobs will come up next.

Tolteca87

I'm seeing the MF and RA station jobs payment in the bank for tomorrow.

I'm in Central London. Lots of jobs within walking distance or short bus/tube trips but lots of shoppers too.

Wizzbang

Is there any way to report Retail Active? They have spammed my home phone and mobiles 12 times this afternoon, in the space of a few hours. I have had no peace. I don't understand what is wrong with them?! They won't leave a message and if someone's not there, they're not going to be there 5 minutes later etc. I've really had enough of them- there work is never worth it anyway. Maybe I'll just remove myself from their database.

I am drafting a complaint to them now...

Cybi-Ping

Wizzbang wrote: »

Is there any way to report Retail Active? They have spammed my home phone and mobile 8 times this afternoon, in the space of a few hours. I have had no peace. I don't understand what is wrong with them?! They won't leave a message and if someone's not there, they're not going to be there 5 minutes later etc. I've really had enough of them- there work is never worth it anyway. Maybe I'll just remove myself from their database.

Either change the phone numbers on your profile questionnaire to 00000000000 or just dump them.

mimi1234

MysteryMan00 wrote: »

Yes, it is a lot of hassle for low fees. I don't know how anyone makes any kind of living (or even part of a living) doing this - or that the money beats doing virtually anything else that pays.

Maybe they know about some lucrative video/audio work that can be done every week? I don't know. I'd be interested to know from the regulars here why they shop and what their aim for the money is!

I used to love doing MS back in the day when they paid travel for almost everything. They even let you buy a whole box of cookies (if prompted), gave you a generous fee and travel on top! Those were the days. Now you will be lucky to get 2 cookies.

These days I do about 10 a month maximum and most of those are with premiums or bonuses. I just don't see the point of doing a visit, asking about 5 different questions, doing a king sized report and then getting paid less than a 2 figure fee. Fork that!

I guess it's easy to earn a full time salary. The more work you do for certain companies, the more and varied "hidden" jobs become available. I think it's well known that the more work you do for UKIMS, the more clients become available to you and before all their other workers. Same with Donkey-osia. But that would mean doing all the low fee jobs for quite some time before you become "special".

Hope you are all earning shed loads from MS :A:A:A

Larac

Wizzbang wrote: »

Is there any way to report Retail Active? They have spammed my home phone and mobiles 12 times this afternoon, in the space of a few hours. I have had no peace. I don't understand what is wrong with them?! They won't leave a message and if someone's not there, they're not going to be there 5 minutes later etc. I've really had enough of them- there work is never worth it anyway. Maybe I'll just remove myself from their database.

I am drafting a complaint to them now...

I changed my profile to a old mobile that's not switched on and they have to leave a message (which they never do). If you do any work and its a proof reading query- they will email you.

Not done anything for months so surprised they have not sacked me off.

mrbanjo

I have to say i'm having my busiest period of the year and i'm fussy when it comes to picking up jobs. Fully booked for the next two weeks doing jobs that pay well. It's fair to say it is entirely possible to earn a good living at the moment, but i'm lucky as this tops up my income.