I am still fairly new to mystery shopping, having only done this for about 7 months. Recently, I have begun creating some short routes - maybe four-five shops in a day. I always sit in my car afterwards and fill out a paper copy or record the particulars in Notes on my phone while the details are still fresh in my memory. I would love to be able to report some of the shops mid-trip, perhaps during lunch so that I don't have as many reports to fill in once I get home. I have considered purchasing a tablet or small laptop to take along for this purpose. My current laptop is big and heavy and would not be convenient. I wonder, however, if I would be able to access many of the MSC sites via a tablet. Some of them are optimized to only work with Google Chrome, or Firefox, for example. So would it really be worthwhile to buy a tablet? How many of you use one to report your shops? Do you find that it won't work for some of the main companies - such as Market Force, Maritz, GFK, Bare, etc. I live in the DFW metroplex and could probably build up some decent routes, giving me the ability to earn more $$!
Any advice will be greatly appreciated. I have truly learned a lot from reading this forum - thanks for being so generous in sharing your advice and experiences!

I have used it for Bare and GFK

For the ones that work best with Google Chrome, you can run Chrome on your tablet -- especially the Android tablets. I do not have a tablet; however, my phone is a Samsung Mega 2 which has a 6 inch screen. Since this is almost as big as some tablets, I use it basically as one. Some MSC's such as GFK and Trendsource and Secret Shopper have apps that are optimized for tablets so it is actually better.

I carry my laptop everywhere I go. So it is always available as far away as my car. But a tablet would be easier for sure to carry. Should work fine and would be worthwhile. Also can write it off as a business expense on your taxes.

I have a tablet. I occasionally use it to enter shops. Most of the time, though, I end up using the tablet to create a WiFi hotspot and connect my netbook through it so I can enter my reports on the computer. It's just less time consuming that way.

I see at least one msc requiring you to use a tablet to enter certain shops.
I think that is against independent contractor rules and GFK is running up
against the contractor vs employee rules....but that is nothing new with them...

I have tried to use a tablet on my routes and have found them to be not very useful. However, that being said, it is a personal decision, IMO.

I have found that they way in which I perform and report my shops, works best with a laptop.. Currently, i use a Dell Inspiron 6000. It is large, yet it has a battery life of 3 hours and the screen is large enough for me to view my reports. I find that i can enter my reports just by sitting in my car whilst outside of a Starbucks and other businesses offering free WiFi.

I also have several backup laptops at home - Dell 600s mostly. They were the workhorse of the traveling salespeople. They sell on EBay for a very reasonable price and their easy and simple to repair.

I might add that for whatever type of device you may select, you should also purchase a power inverter that plugs into your vehicle's accessory outlet. They are a battery saver!

Yes. Yes. Yes.

I got a Samsung 10" for $199. It is truly a godsend. Even with MSCs that require "paperwork". I save the paperwork as a PDF. I use my tablet with all MSCs I contract my services to. I highly recommend the investment. You can claim it is as a business expense if you claim business income but i can only say that for those who are in Canada..

I have a laptop and desktop but I use those when I am at home. I find it is too awkward to carry around the laptop.

Definitely worth it! A month or two ago I started doing shops with an ipad mini and a zagg keyboard case. The integrated camera alone makes it worthwhile. No more scanning receipts or transferring photos from a camera or phone to a computer. I just take pics of the receipts, bank documentation, POV, whatever...then it's super quick to upload right into the report with no middle step. I did a business audit with it and it was a snap to do. I drove around the corner to type up and upload the report in my car using my iphone's connection. I figure my time is money, and the less time reports take me, the more time I have to do more shops...or something else fun. The ipad setup saves me time, no question.

If you can borrow one, visit your most common MSC to see the compatibility. I have an iPad and while it helps for some MSC, there are others where the pop up window doesn't work on the tablet. There may be ways around that, but I don't know them. I find voice to text extremely helpful for narratives as that's much, MUCH easier than typing on a tablet, which can be very difficult.

I have a Microsoft Surface. I like it. It's super light. I have a whole pile of laptops too, but this is easier for traveling. I don't have to take it out of my suitcase for TSA either. I paid extra for a better keyboard though a few months later. The touch pads were impossible to use for typing reports. I like the USB port. I use a wired mouse. I can unplug the mouse and transfer things to a thumb drive too. Super convenient.

Thank-you for the quick, helpful responses! It sounds like it would be worth the investment. Thanks for sharing!

I have an iPad, and I love it. I use it as much as I can, but I generally still need a laptop to finish up my shops.

1) I don't like typing on my iPad, so I use Word with spellcheck for my narratives.
2) This may be user error, but I don't know how to save a completed report on my iPad. On the laptop, I print all of my finished reports to PDF, so I have an electronic copy.
3) With some shop reports, I cannot upload multiple photos from my iPad. This could also be user error, but I don't know how to name them. Some shops refuse to accept more than one photo from the iPad. I have to go to the laptop, save the photo with a unique name to the disk, and then upload. It is so much easier when I am able to do it from the iPad.

It also use both at the same time when completing reports. If I am typing a narrative on the laptop, I refer to the questionnaire on the iPad.

I have to say that the iPad is one of the best purchases I have ever made, for general ease of use compared to a computer.

I use mine to save printing forms and guidelines heavy with pictures, also for audits and business verifications. I use Evernote to stream the report form in its original format from my desktop to my iPad. (Install the Evernote extension on your Chrome browser and the App on your tablet.) The greatest ever!! I complete the form and then email a copy to myself. I recently upgraded to the iPad Air so I can upload pictures directly to report (although only in Safari, not the Chrome app) and I figured out how to mark on those in PDF form. I'd like to get dictation to work for me but haven't put the time in. Any reports that are heavy on the narrative I generally wait till I get home to my desktop. Although I did get a cool new bluetooth keyboard that may make it easier.
Have you tried doing a search on this forum? There have been several threads that provide great tips on using iPads for mystery shopping.

I was doing all my reports on my Macbook but it was too heavy to carry around so I bought a HP chromebook for under $300. It is light and has a long battery life. There has been a learning curve since I was used to my mac but worth it for me. If I have time between shops I can always stop at a Starbucks or library to do reports. The only MSC that was giving me a headache was Marketforce but since their site has changed chrome works really well and they even have a resize button so attaching piks is not a problem.

Just popping in to keep track of this topic.

@teriraia wrote:

I was doing all my reports on my Macbook but it was too heavy to carry around so I bought a HP chromebook for under $300. It is light and has a long battery life. There has been a learning curve since I was used to my mac but worth it for me. If I have time between shops I can always stop at a Starbucks or library to do reports. The only MSC that was giving me a headache was Marketforce but since their site has changed chrome works really well and they even have a resize button so attaching piks is not a problem.

Chromebooks are a great option. They are very lightweight. Most only have 1-2GB RAM so it is only good for this purpose. If you want to run other programs other than email and Chrome, it might get slow.

I think a tablet would be worthwhile if you had a Bluetooth keyboard. Might have to play around with it to get it to work properly. I use Open Office for just about everything which the tablets do not do so well with. I do not want to invest in Microsoft Office. But might have to for business reasons. For reporting devices, I have a phablet 4 that I just got, a Samsung Tab 3 which can't find the pictures on google drive, An HP 7 that is mostly used as a E-reader. An Asus notebook that I hate (five minutes start up time) because it always is updating something whenever I turn it on. Had a brief fling with a Motorola Dock for my Bionic phone but they killed that when Google bought Motorola and started pushing the Chrome book about a month after I got it that was two years ago. The only thing good is I didn't pay $350.00 for it. $80.00 on Amazon planning on converting it to a Raspberry Pi or a Beagle box laptop.

Thanks everyone. eveb, I did do a search regarding tablets, but couldn't find anything. Perhaps I should have specified iPad in my search, I'll try again. You all have given me some great things to think about. I would love to purchase both a tablet and small laptop, but can only afford one or the other at the moment. Your mentions of specific tablet and laptop models is helpful because I want to be sure to get one powerful enough to do everything I need it to do, but want to spend as little as possible (I know. . . you get what you pay for, but funds are limited at the moment).
Thanks!

Its worthwhile. A Tablet is optional for the GFK Shops, the shops can be entered online if you chose to do the shops with pen and paper. I've done them both way and its just so much easier with the tablet. Only paid $39.00 US for the tablet I use.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/21/2015 01:06AM by ShoppingDad.

I bought my notebook at WalMart and I saw notebooks for under $200. They will be limited as dixiewhiskey (cute name) stated above. My chromebook is good for email and mystery shopping because of the price and long battery life (12 hours easy) and how light it is to carry. If you have a printer make sure it is cloud enabled to make it a little easier to sync. Good luck - hope this helps.

tablet deal: 7 inch windows 8.1 tablet with 1 year of office 365 included and free 25 dollar windows gift card...79 dollars...direct from microsoft
[www.microsoftstore.com]

I have both a laptop and a tablet. I do reports on both. The tablet is more useful in the car as I travel. The laptop is better at home or in a hotel.

@techman01 wrote:

tablet deal: 7 inch windows 8.1 tablet with 1 year of office 365 included and free 25 dollar windows gift card...79 dollars...direct from microsoft
[www.microsoftstore.com]

You can get the HP Stream 8 with Windows from Amazon.com for $150. It comes with the office package as well as 200 MB of data per month free from T Mobile for the life of the phone. I bought one of these and I really like it. It has 4G Although it is not "LTE" 4G, but still a good built in hotspot unlike the one referenced above by Techman01. The one Techman referenced will not be a hotspot without purchasing a mobile device and data to go with it.

200 mb isn't much -- I wonder what they charge if you go over.

I have a mifi so I carry my own hotspot with me. If I didn't have that, the Stream would appeal to me. But that's twice the price (almost) of Techman's suggestion. I ordered one of those just as a quick-grab and go device. I'll probably tape the mifi to the back of it, LOL.

It is an inch bigger and it has a built in hotspot.

No, 200 MB isn't much, but it is better than nothing at all. I don't plan on going over that. I'll go to somewhere that has wifi if I'm out and about and use that. I could also purchase a pay as you go thing from Walmart for T Mobile, or I could get another sim card and get another carrier all together that could be pay as I go or contract. There are a lot of options for this because of the G4.

Techman posted a great tablet deal in the General Discussion area: [www.mysteryshopforum.com]

Can I replace Windows 8 with Win7 on a notebook?

@walesmaven wrote:

Can I replace Windows 8 with Win7 on a notebook?

First thing you need to to if it is an OEM system is pay to upgrade to Windows 8 Pro to have a license that is "Downgrade authorized"

Here is the official Microsoft Policy: [support.microsoft.com]

Then you need to make sure the drivers exist for your hardware!

This is something that used to be a definite yes. Now, there are a few chip companies that are making a single integrated sound, wifi, and Ethernet chips and did not make a legacy driver for Windows 7 or Vista. You may want to research the support page of the laptop before you purchase it to make certain there are Windows 7 drivers and for 32 bit or 64 bit as well. If your running 64 bit, you need to be certain the windows 7 driver is available in 64 bit.

To make it more confusing is the fact that you can often get drivers from the chip manufacturers site that support more platforms and are more updated than what the device manufacturers site. An example of this would be my gaming PC.

When my motherboard was released, Windows 7 was not released yet. The company stopped making the motherboard and stopped updating the support site with current drivers. I went to the sound card company's website (Realtek) and downloaded 64 bit Windows 8.1 drivers. I went to the Intel website and downloaded the latest 64 bit Network drivers as well. Then I had to go to the website of the sata disk drive interface and get the driver for Windows 8 there as well.

This is not a yes or no question unless you post the exact brand and model you are inquiring about.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/03/2015 04:12PM by scanman1.

A tablet should be thought of as a supplement to a good laptop. You need to run Java for many MSC websites and your tablet will not work correctly for those sites. For some shops, it can be great to fill out easy shops in the field.
If you throw in a good Bluetooth keyboard, you can even type in narratives without too much effort.

I have a Logitech K810 Bluetooth keyboard that Logitech sent me to replace a discontinued keyboard that failed almost three years after I bought it. It has hotkeys to switch between three devices on the fly. I use it for my Android phone, Android tablet, and my home PC.

Logitech has a great warranty program and will replace anything that is not physically damaged or had a glass of Coke spilled into it.

[www.logitech.com]