So yesterday I had 6 shops scheduled. I take off one day M-F to do shops, and then the majority on the weekends. I printed out all of the information, printed out the google.com/maps route I needed to take, had everything in order.

Everything's honkey-dory, right? Nope, of course not, and of COURSE it is when I am absolutely exhausted. (I've been living on 4 hours of sleep daily, I don't know why, I just can't sleep well right now).

I get to the address of the the 4th shop, a cell phone shop. It's not there. My map has it supposed to be there. This IS the address on the survey. It's a strip mall, and the anchor store has the #5001. The next store is 5031. The next is 5051, and the last store is 5071. I'm supposed to be at #5002. Hmmm.. okay, where is it? It COULD be in store #5031, but it's supposed to be a stand-alone at this location.

ACK! I'm scrambling, tossing papers left and right, I cannot find my survey sheet with this shop's address and phone number! Pull out the trusty phone. Try and use my "smart phone" and get online. Realize of course, it's a smart phone - but not meant for a dingbat in panic mode. I cannot text for my life. Keyboard on a laptop? OH YEAH! On a phone? HA HA HA! I manage to open my email and find the shop assignment. YUP, right address. I call the cell phone shop...

And get a voice mail. *bangs head on steering wheel, hereby alerting others in the parking lot there's a psychotic female sitting there wailing*

I wait 30-45 minutes in the parking lot for a return call. Nuttin honey. (still never have had the return call either)

So.... I finally make it home, look up the address late last night...on mapquest

And the LOCATION is several blocks south of where I was. I emailed the scheduler and let them know. My ??? to myself is.. "how can 5001 be several blocks NORTH and I needed to be at 5002 which was several blocks SOUTH of 5001?"

Someone please tell me I'm now initiated into the wonderful world of Mystery Shopping? I can't take much more of flying papers and steering wheel imprints!

I've had many moments like this and thank my higher power of choice for my iPad, Google Maps and Jump, a VPN app that connects me directly to my desktop as if I'm sitting in front of it. Saved the day many, many times and good for picking up hot shops, too.

I think we all have had those moments. I did an out of town route this summer. Drive around looking for a location and can't find it. It is in a downtown area with businesses inside of buildings so get out and am walking through the skyways from building to building trying to find it, but can't locate it.

Finally call to get directions, but still have difficulty. Get back in my car and drive around for a while and eventually figure out that even though the paperwork says it is at 301 E. ____ road it is at 301 W. so a few blocks away. I do see the sign on the outside of the building. Since it is a bank where you are going to to inquire about opening a checking account, I figure I might be made as a shopper if I go in right away. I have a few other shops to do in the area and do those and come back.

I had been given 6 locations to do all on the same day. Every other location is open until 5 pm. I head back over just before 4 pm. Find a parking spot and walk up. I follow the directions I was given to go to the second floor which is a retail mall type area. I don't see it anywhere. I go into 3 stores and not one of the employees knows where it is.

I finally find the location down a little hallway all by itself. As I am approaching, I see someone closing the doors and locking them. I look at my watch and it is 4:29 pm. The posted hours say they close at 4:30.

The kicker was all the other locations I finished in about 10 minutes or less. This one I spent close to 90 minutes trying to locate it. It had been bonused to $15 and I was being given $30 extra for completing the route of 6 for the distance. Since I didn't complete all 6, they refused to pay the shop (as expected) and refused to pay the $30 because of not completing all of them. To be fair, they did say they would pay it if I went again, but the distance was too far to go for a lone shop even with the bonus pay.

It happens klhofbauer. There is a similar situation here where a 1600 number is in the 1800 block because they have a shopping center of sorts that the original entrance to the land parcel was in the 1600 block. Only later did they open an entrance in the 1800 block, which has now become the main entrance. And yes, it can become quite confusing.

The other one that is choice is you are looking for 1412 and pull into the lot marked 1400-1480 where 1412 should be only to discover that the buildings are marked A, B, C, D. You start playing guessing games. Probably your location is in building A, which logically should contain 1400-1420. Wrong! It is in building C because they lettered the buildings in the order built, not in their physical location or any other determinable logic. Only once you are at the mailboxes for the building will you see the 1412 as it is not marked on the exterior of the building in any other manner.

And yes, the anomalies do become part of the learning curve for your area. Since the vast majority of shops are repeated over and over, next time you go to perform your funky location you will go straight there with no delays. And a certain location I shop, where after a few years they have still not corrected the address, I know the first line of narrative will explain that 2648 is a field with cows and the store is located at 2468. I then can continue with the report.

Entrances and exits to parking lots that will get you going the direction you want to go will become second nature, as will short cuts that no GPS will suggest nor Google Maps or other software offer. You will become attuned to those streets with properly timed lights that allow you move with the fewest stops at red lights and those streets that just waste your time. You will become attuned to traffic because different times of day have different traffic conditions. There is an area I avoid at lunch time because there are too many cars trying to get in and out of the fast food places. Similarly a route might be run as stores A, B, C, D during morning hours while doing it D, C, B, A in the afternoon will be easier due to traffic.

For all my shops I first Google the place. I look at the "Street View" which shows all the buildings, landmarks, ect. Then I put it in my GPS (sometimes address not found) so I go back to the computer and figure something out.

3 times I have found errors from the MS company and have emailed them, they were nice about it, thanked me and changed the address. I had a 301 that was 310 ____ street, as example.

My weirdest shop of this kind was an address I could not find anywhere. I ended up driving around a huge area looking for places of business. What I saw were airplanes landing and taking off. I finally found a building in the middle of the field with some people going in and out. I parked, walked to it and when I told them what I was looking for they said there was no such thing. Finally, one of the employees said there used to be, but they moved ... into the airport. It turns out they kept the same address, which is really the airport's address with an added number for the store location.
It was behind security, naturally, and was therefore unreachable unless you have a ticket or a badge.
Spent over two hours to find out I couldn't shop it.
MSP paid me, but I bet they weren't happy.

I had a physical address (a highway intersection) in a county that was completely different than the city given. Neither highway is in this city. I learned to not use map quest because I was given direction to the city. I knew that neither highway was in that city. I called the station and they were where I thought they were. The highway intersection was 50-60 miles west and north of the city listed. Called the MSC and liked to have never gotten them to understand what was going on and then they wanted a photo. Needless to say I didn't get one.

The funny thing was the same job with the wrong address was listed twice more on their job board when the new rounds came out. I got my 10' pole.