New Shops

I haven't had much to post lately! I am keeping busy with my mystery shopping still. Going back to work has slowed me down quite a bit, since I can only shop on the weekends! However, Thanksgiving is coming up next month and I get a whole week off! Just today, one of the companies came out with a new set of shops. They start on the 17th and are daily until the first weekend in December. I have taken an average three shops a day over the Thanksgiving break and on the weekends. They pay $8 and it looks to be a 10 minute shop. There is only one page of input and you don't even have to interact with an employee!!! I took 21 shops!

I have promised myself to slow down on my mystery shopping. The first weekend of the month is usually my busiest weekend, just because of how the shops come out. Now you may be saying to yourself, YOU just took 21 shops. Well, those shops are over 10 days! As the month goes on, I block out certain days to take either NO shops or very few shops. I have started telling myself NO, when I start thinking over shops I might want to take. I also make sure I check my calendar before accepting new shops, this keeps me from over booking myself!

I am hoping that when Christmas break comes, I can pick up some extra shops. I do plan on doing a LOT of baking though, so I will block off days that I won't shop! This is also true for the weekends in December, since I like to bake for people at work to give out gifts!

I will be busy this weekend though! I have ten shops on Saturday and nine on Sunday! I do like those paychecks though and many of the shops this weekend I get reimbursed for the gas I purchase. WOOHOO!

Bonus Fees!

There are times when a mystery shopper can earn bonus fees for shops. This can really add to your paycheck. The majority of the companies I work for offer bonus fees at some time or another. Some offer them more willingly than others.  Most of them are not eager to offer bonus fees and with those it usually starts with a phone call asking if I can do a shop that is due soon, that no one has signed up for. Sometimes they ask you what you would like the bonus to be and other times they offer you the bonus.

Just a few weeks ago, I got a phone call from a company that has NEVER called me before. They offered me $12 bonus to do a shop that paid $7 already, plus $1.25 reimbursement. So I did a $7 shop, but with the bonus I was paid $19+$1.25! That made for a nice bump in my check. I don't get bonuses with this company very much.

Another company starts by adding the bonus on the website to entice people to sign up for the shop. They also send emails to you offering the shop with a $3-$5 bonus. This company also calls to offer you a shop. Just last night I got a phone call from them asking me to do a late night shop(after 8:15). He asked me what it would take for me to do this shop and I told him a $5 bonus. This doubled the fee from $5 to $10 plus up to $5.65 reimbursement. He agreed to the $5 and offered me another shop and agreed to the $5 bonus on that one and yet another one. I went from earning just $15 for three shops to $30 for the shops, plus a total of $16.95 in reimbursement. This is a food shop, so that makes for a late night snack for Jacob! One of these was a breakfast shop! It also makes for a very busy week this week!

Another company never offers bonus fees ON the actual website. They only call and they rarely offer the bonus. I generally have to ask IF there is a bonus and generally they will agree to one. Sometimes they won't and I turn down the shop. These are shops that no one has taken and usually it is because of the distance to the shop. It isn't worth it for me to drive for a $10 shop unless there is a bonus, and they usually agree to pay the bonus because they don't call until they are desperate.

I am going to try to slow down with the shops though if I can! It is nice to have the extra money and work when I want to work. It is hard to turn down a shop when a bonus is offered though!

Weekend of Shops!

Between my partner and I we had several restaurant shops this past three day weekend. The majority of them did not go well for the servers. The food took way to long to get to us because they were just slow or because the order was put in wrong. Most of these servers could have earned a gift card of some sort, but none of them did. The managers were informed that they did not pass and didn't earn the gift card. The managers were not please, lets just say that!

The nice thing for us is we haven't cooked dinner in three nights. We have had some kind of meal from a restaurant to feed us! This makes for a cheap date night! We get reimbursed for 85-90% of the meal! We also try foods we might not otherwise try!

Passing the QUIZ

I work for five different mystery shopping companies and all of them require some sort of QUIZ before you can start doing a specific shop. However, the rigor of the tests differ with all of the companies.


Company #1-- I work for lets you take the quiz and then lists the questions with the correct answers. If you got it correct GREAT, and if you didn't, well then here is the correct answer. I copy them all down and take the quiz again....COOL! No problems. Once I pass the test, I never have to take it again. This is really nice, because the same types of shops come up each month and I don't want to have to retake the quiz!!!

Company #2--This company has you take the quiz EACH time you sign up for a specific kind of shop, even if you just did one JUST LIKE it the week before. The nice thing is, they tell you which ones you got wrong and you just try again. You keep trying until you get it right! NOT so bad, and after a while you really learn the answers because you keep taking the same test.

Company #3 and #4--You take complete a short questionnaire about the shop. They ask questions about if your family works for this company or if you have ever worked for this company. You just have to really pay attention and not rush through them, because if you mess it up and get one wrong then you can't do any shops for that kind of shop the whole month!

Company #5--Now this company takes its quizzes seriously. You take the quiz for each type of shop that you sign up for each month. So if you do 30 bank shops in April, you still have to take the same bank quiz in May. You get three chances to take it and if you miss more than 80% of the questions, they don't even tell you WHICH ones you got wrong. So you better take your time and look up each question. If you fail it three times, then you can call in and speak to someone who coaches you on the questions you miss and generally you still get the shops. Now the bank quiz is not too bad, because they are each month and the questions generally stay the same. This is also true for some of the gas shops, HOWEVER there is one particular gas shop that comes out with a different quiz EACH period they occurs(which is about three times a year) and has 25-30 questions.

Just tonight, I printed the test and looked up the answers. I was SURE I got them all right, but I missed six. I didn't even know which six. Well, my partner takes the same quiz so she came in and we searched for answers. I TOOK the test again and missed three questions, but NOW I knew which three. Well she had already failed it once so SHE took it again after we LOOKED up answers again--we really couldn't find some of them and we both have college degrees--and kept track of past answers....well she missed ONE question and we had already tried 2 of the 3 answer choices so NOW we knew the answer. She passed it on her third try and then I took the sheet and passed it on my last try. IT was almost like studying for a final exam!

We are keeping this test just in case some of the questions show up again during the next period these come out! Never take these quizzed lightly, you never know when you might read something too quickly(which I had done a few times) and get one wrong, just because you misread something!

Too Many French Fries!

Between my partner and I, we do a lot of fast food shops as well as some fast casual(as the mystery shopper companies call them) and so we bring a lot of food home. Many of these shops serve french fries as a side item and so we end up with a LOT of french fries. You would think the boys would love to eat them, but even they get tired of them after a while. So, what do we do with all of those french fries?? We could just throw them out, but my partner doesn't like to waste food. Thankfully, she has a friend whose mom has a chicken farm, so we FREEZE all of the french fries and give them to her when we see her. Right now, we have two plastic grocery store bags filled with french fries! I am glad we have an outside freezer to put these in or we wouldn't be able to do this.

I go back to work tomorrow, so we shouldn't have AS much fast food as we have during the summer when I have more time to go to lunch for a mystery shop. I already have some shops lined up for next month though! I need to start saving for Christmas!

Jacob Becomes a Mystery Shopper

One of the companies I work for has some jobs where you need a teenager. Basically, Jacob has to try to purchase something that only a person that is 18 or older can purchase. The teenager has to be between 15 and 17 years of age. He goes into the store ahead of me and then I enter the store and enter the same general area where he is. He finds what he needs to purchase and I watch from a distance. He had been hesitant to work with me on this, because he is easily embarrassed. I finally talked him into trying at least ONE time and told him I would pay him HALF of what I make on the shop, which is $5.50. This may not seem like a lot, but it is for only about five minutes worth of work on his part!

We did the first one the other day and he was nervous. However, as we were discussing our "plan" he said, "this is like we are planning a spy mission!" He is too cute, even at 16. So he went in and the plan went just fine. We have to be sure we don't seem like we are together, so Jacob has to ignore me. Well, that isn't hard!! He took his product up to the check stand and was asked for ID.  He said he didn't have any, and the sales person said he couldn't sell him the the product. Jacob walked off and then I waited and went near the salesperson to get his name and description! Pretty easy, right? Even the input at home is only ten questions and four of those are about the receipt. We met back at the car and on the way home Jacob says, "That was pretty easy, when are we doing another one?"

I found one more shop for us to do yesterday, and we have two more scheduled for the first weekend in September. He did well at the one yesterday, but this time the sales associate SOLD him the product. I was watching from a distance and he was never asked for ID and just bought the product, no questions asked. Well, I walked by and got the associates name and description, then met Jacob at the car. I got the product and the receipt and was able to return it, which is what we are told to do with the shop instructions. I got the money back, but kept the receipt showing the sale. I have to upload that receipt and turn it in to the mystery shopping company. I then came home and did the report, which took all of five minutes.

I am glad that Jacob is taking interest in having a job and making his own money. I think that is important, and maybe when he turns 18 he will decide he wants to do mystery shopping to help pay for things while in college. We shall see!

One Month of Summer Left

With just a month left of summer, I am planning my shops for August. I am trying very hard NOT to over plan. I want to have a few days off so the boys and I can enjoy the last bit of summer. Of course, it is too hot here to be outside for long, but we can always swim. I have a few trips to East Texas for teaching, yea working before school actually starts, and so I am picking up a few shops in the area. I have a few days that I am really booked with shops and other days that I have blocked out as NO SHOP days.

I have decided that I am not going to overwork myself once school gets started. I am going to do some mystery shopping on the weekends, but try to limit it and spend more quality time with the boys. I also like to attend a monthly Tourette support group and haven't gone much this past year. I want to plan on getting back into that.

I hope everyone else is enjoying their summer!