I’ve always been under the impression that there is no such thing as a real “mystery shopper” job, that they are all work-at-home scams, similar to the old “envelope-stuffing” swindles.
But then I stumbled across this article from the Federal Trade Commision. It outlines all the scams, but also does recommend that prospective shoppers visit the “Mystery Shoppers Providers Organization” at http://www.mysteryshop.org/
So I went there, and soon found a bunch of what appear to be legit “shops”. They just seem too good to be true…for instance, one “shop” has you review a meal eater at the bar of a local steakhouse…there is no pay, but your meal is reimbursed (they say “through paypal” for up to $25). That sounds like a good deal. But I’m skeptical.
A co-worker did it locally here in south Florida. It was legitimate, but it turned out to be a lot of work for a relatively small amount of money, and you have to keep scrupulous records or you won’t get paid. It also involved photo-taking and a good measure of driving around and photocopying, so there was an outgoing cost to be considered on top of the incoming profit.
Yes, legit ones do exist. They operate pretty much as you describe. The shopper orders a meal that needs to meet certain requirements (number in your party, courses ordered, questions asked of server, etc.) and gets reimbursed, possibly plus some small amount, in exchange for filling out a detailed survey.
I used to work in a newspaper classified advertising department, and the folks who worked there had the inside scoop on how to sign up with the legit outfits. I never did it personally, but coworkers definitely did. Other gigs included things like making copies at Kinkos or mailing something at a post office. My coworkers were generally in demand as shoppers, too, because they worked full-time in customer service and took the surveys seriously.
It was legit, but it was no tremendous gravy train. It was kind of like a part-time job where you got a lot of your payment in kind.
Yep, they’re legit but I dated a girl that did this and my impression was that she was wasting her time. Here are some of her shops that I remember.
One she did for Exxon where she had to buy at least $5 of gas plus buy something inside. She was paid $10. She actually did 4 of them at once so I drove her to all four stations (about 10 miles apart), got $5 in gas, bought a stick of gum inside, took photos of all the gas pumps, and spent two hours filling out a report. I’ll let you decide if it was worth it.
She liked Sonic so she did a lot of those. Usually, she would make $10. She had to get a combo ($6 if you don’t leave a tip) and fill out some paperwork detailing everything the Sonic people said to you. (How long from the time you pushed the button until they asked what you wanted? How long from placing the order to the time they brought it? Did they ask if you want fries with that? Did they mention the special on smoothies? What was the server’s name? What did she look like?)
She did get a few good ones. Several times she made $20 for calling cell phone stores to ask about cell plans, or calling tire companies to get info and a quote on new tires, and she got $20 to go into a Harley dealership and ask about a certain pink leather jacket they had. My impression was that jobs like that are grabbed by the first person to see them and most paid very little. I finally got tired of doing them when we were together because I had to pay for everything.
Also, it takes a while to get paid for a lot of them. Sometimes 6 weeks or so.
I have had a lot of weird little jobs, include of this one. It can be legit. What I mostly had to do was buy something at a store at one mall, and then return it to the same store, different mall. So, lots of driving. I got a set amount–not much–per gig, plus mileage (at whatever the IRS reimbursed rate was). The way to make it worthwhile is to have many little things like this so you can do your thing at one mall for multiple stores, and I know of people who did it for awhile and didn’t make bad money. It could take a couple of weeks to get paid, but except for the gas I wasn’t out any money up front (since I returned everything).
I don’t know anyone who did it for very long, though.
The same outfit that gave me assignments got me into two or three focus groups and one “shadow jury” thing. The shadow jury was $100 + mileage for about 4 hours work and it was very interesting, much more so than mystery shopping.
The place I got these assignments called itself a marketing research firm. If I could remember the name, I’d post it.
I got a couple of jobs like these through a well-known temp agency. In one of them, I had to go to a local assisted-living facility and pretend I was checking it out for a grandparent. I got the whole shpiel and had to write it up. It was about 4-5 hours work for $100. Not bad.
My girl used to work at one and, yes, they (being corporate office) would hire random people to go out and “mystery shop” the concession employees. In return the mystery shoppers got their movie and popcorn for free. Not a bad deal.
My dad was a mystery shopper (eater?) for Shoney’s several years back. It was great at first but he had to eat there at least 5 times a month and it got old, fast. For a while he’d invite us to come with him, then make us order and eat the food! Eventually he got so sick of Shoney’s, he quit. He still won’t eat there.
Not direct experience, but a friend of mine did it for a while. Her oldest was an infant/toddler at the time and she could pick up extra money while watching him and doing things she’d normally do (get gas, go grocery shopping, etc.) with just a little more detail and a camera phone.
According to her, the more you did, the better jobs you were eligible for. She stopped later on, but she did enjoy it while it lasted, and it was a little bit extra money.
My mom and I have both done it; I did it ages ago, my mom still does it from time to time. IIRC the company for whom I did it was called “Synovate,” and I also did surveys for them online that netted me $30-50 a month.
I had to go around to fast food restaurants and take photographs of drive-thru signs, write down prices posted for a few dozen items, drive through and order some stuff, go inside and order stuff, check for order accuracy, speediness, etc. I also had one weeks-long project wherein I carried a PalmPilot around and had to fill out a pages-long survey on every single beverage I consumed… I got reimbursed for beverage purchases and got a hefty check on top of it.
My mom’s done a bunch of different ones, the most boring of which involved visiting convenience stores and counting bottles of drinks in the coolers, and buying whatever was on special to see if the prices posted were correct.
I’ve done a few gigs because it seems fun and interesting, but really, these people are so detail oriented that it takes the fun out of things. I had to keep flawless track of every time: time entered store, time waited before being greeted, time talked to employee about topic X or Y (whatever the assignment called for), time waited in check out line, time exited store, names of employees (talked to, greeted, checked out, etc).
Plus the whole write up afterwards. The shop may last 20 minutes, but the whole process is a few hours. You have to be pretty organized and remember what you need to be doing. It wasn’t difficult, really, but it was rather involved. If I was a stay at home dad or something, I’d try doing it more. But working full time, it’s just not worth the pain. Oh, and don’t even get me started on all the on-line training and currency requirements. Ugh.
I’ve done mystery shopping on and off for several years, and I’m “silver certified” with the MSPA.
There are a lot of companies that pay really poorly, but, smaller companies tend to pay more. The big guys (say, Corporate Research International) will pay you about $5 for an assignment and report and training that will take you about 3 hours the first time. Then again, I did a relatively simple assignment recently for a hospital, which was $100 for about an hour of work. I’m a recurring shopper for this company.
Basically, you need to do quite a bit of grunt work but it is possible to make decent money if you work at it. Mostly you can get a good amount of free stuff. Fast food and gas shops are typically the lowest tier, but cell phone shops and banking are the lowest paying stuff I’ll do anymore (around $12 - $20 for a 15 minute visit and a 15 minute form). Granted all the training and stuff is on your own time so the way to make money is to keep doing stuff and learning the shortcuts. Fine dining shops are generally pretty decent as well - you won’t get paid, but you can get a nice night out.
The MSPA forum is a good place to get good information, as is Volition.com. You have to sign up with hundreds of companies to finally find good ones.
Unfortunately the industry is a hotbed for scammers, much like many work-at-home or work-from-home opportunities. Other than MSPA certification and reimburseable shop expenses, if you never pay anything up front, you’ll probably be okay.
PM me if you have a question about a specific mystery shopping company. Chances are, I’ve worked with them or know a lot about them. I’ve been very involved with the mystery shopper community.
My income varies heavily but one of the easiest times to mystery shop is right before Christmas - the stay-at-home moms are too busy and I can clean up with last minute bonuses from cancellations. It makes for a bunch of checks flying in right when the credit cards are due in January.
Also, I do a significant number of shops via telephone. A lot of companies will try to lowball you on this sort of work (paying $2 or less) but I routinely do phone shops which take (at most) 15 minutes of time total and get paid $8 - $10 each.
You’ll learn pretty fast which shops are too picky and too much work for the effort and which are easy. Market Force for example pays low but their shop forms are easy - no long narratives - and they offer a ton of shops in most areas so they’re really good for stopping in over a lunchbreak or on the way to another shop. Intellishop on the other hand has some really picky-ass editors and don’t pay very much, but because of this, they frequently have to bonus their shops so you can make 2 or 3 times as much if you wait until they are desperate. Bestmark pays poorly on some but has some other very decent shops that they will ‘trade’ you if you take a crap assignment (or if you wait until month’s end).
Those are generalizations (each client is different) but you can learn an awful lot reading the mystery shopper forums.
The full-time mystery shoppers do a lot more ‘merchandising’, which is stuff like setting up store displays, and doing things like announced audits which take several hours. Personally I find that these jobs don’t pay all that well but from what I understand you need to have some experience to get the ‘good’ ones. I work full time so I’m pretty much looking for short and easy stuff that I can do quickly because I type fast and have done so many assignments that I could do them in my sleep.
This is the problem. I almost did one recently, but on reading the requirements, I had to visit 2-3 departments (I forget), check out with a certain phrasing, write up a giant log, and file the report, all to get paid something like $10. In the end I decided I was getting paid like a high schooler to do something that didn’t sound like fun at all. This was for a prominent drugstore chain.
Yeah, I shop for several companies and have found it to be worthwhile.
The nice thing is that you can pick and choose which assignments you want to do, so you can avoid the kind where you have to take a million photos and take super scrupulous notes. I know of some fast food assignments where you’re supposed to sit in your car and time the drive through transactions before taking copious pictures of the building exterior. Yuck.
Mystery shopping works out well for me because money is not overly abundant in our household. I have a lovely but low paying job, and my husband is a grad student, so we especially like the restaurant shops because it’s a way for us to go out for an evening without feeling guilty that we’re wasting cash that could be paying off student loans. For instance, two weeks ago we ate at Biaggi’s with a reimbursement budget of $80. Last weekend I did an assignment for Bruegger’s Bagels where I had to buy a dozen bagels and some drinks. We’ve also gone to IMAX movies and been reimbursed. The reports you’re required to do vary from company to company, but I’ve never had one take longer than 30 minutes to write up. It usually takes anywhere from 2 to 6 weeks to be paid/reimbursed - which is usually done through Paypal.
I don’t see how anyone could make a living from doing mystery shopping, but it’s a good way to make some pocket money or stretch your entertainment budget.
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I’ve always been under the impression that there is no such thing as a real “mystery shopper” job, that they are all work-at-home scams, similar to the old “envelope-stuffing” swindles.
I mystery shop all month long. I work as an independent contractor. It is my second job. I earn about $600 a month doing this, plus get some nice perks, such as full reimbursement (to certain dollar limits known in advance, varies per job…) for casual to fine dining, and things like gas and groceries. I often get paid to call and find out my bank balance. I have fun as I enjoy these activities, or getting paid to do things I need to do anyway, like buy gas or grocery shop.
Here’s the rub. Generally speaking, you need to be/have:
[ul]
Observant
Objective
Good grammar, punctuation, spelling and writing skills
Your own net connection, as most reports are filed electronically (and many of these are within 12 hours of task completion)
[/ul]
If you google “Mystery Shopping Forum” you will find several good forums on this topic, where you can read what others say about the MSC co’s. and MS’ing in general. From these, you will find lists of legitimate companies. Some have been mentioned in this thread by other folks.
Do you need good acting skills to be a mystery shopper? I know I’d be fighting real hard not to break down and blurt out, “Okay, I did it! Corporate sent me in with a wire and I’ve been recording everything that happened around me for the past 15 minutes! And this isn’t a shopping list either!”
I’m a mystery shopper for a chain of gas stations.
When I was hired, I indicated which locations (about 6 of them) that I’m willing to visit. I’m assigned two stations per month with a 2 week window to visit each one. I buy gas and note specific actions and appearance of the pump attendant and counter person as well as the appearance of the station’s exterior and interior.
It takes me about 5 minutes to enter my observations on-line.
It doesn’t hurt to have acting skills, and sometimes is helpful. But most situations, you are just acting as yourself - a customer at the establishment.
Lily wrote that she never had any take over 30 minutes to complete. I just did 2 high end stores where in-store time was a total of 15 minutes at each store, but the reports took about 45 minutes each. I made $60 total, so $30 an hour. Not bad. And the fine dining I do requires about 2000-3000 words, so it definitely takes over a half hour for me. Often an hour a half on those, for me. The pastry store is 5 min in and out, and 5 minutes reporting. The gas station is he same. Groceries, vary per company and reason being shopped. I have a couple co’s I contract with that NONE of their forms ever take more than 5 minutes, and a couple that I will never do certain shops for again, as the time investment was not worth the meager pay…
