Everything else is up 3-5 times. Gas is up from $2/gallon to $3.50-$4.50/gallon. Minimum hourly pay is now $9 in CA, up from $8.25 not too long ago. Rent is way up. Parking meters went up too. However, Mystery Shopping seems to have stood still. There is one MSC offering the same $11.50 coffee shops, which has not changed for four years. I checked back their shops 4 years ago, and it is exactly the same, even though their specialty lattes is now $3.75-$4.25 instead of $2.75-$3.

We simply need to just refuse to sign up to these cheap shops, and wait for them to hike up their pay with bonus. As long as there are shoppers taking the shops, it will not get any higher any time soon.

I agree the the cost of living has increased, and, for the most part, payment and reimbursement for MSC evaluations has not increased. I can think of several examples in which payment/reimbursement has decreased.

Basic economics 101: supply and demand determines the rate of payment. In most areas, there is a huge supply of would-be mystery shoppers (and rapidly increasing!) There are a somewhat limited number of shops available. I have not seen a very large increase in the number of new clients who are being shopped. I agree that as long as there are shoppers taking and completing these assignments, they will not increase in value.

BUT - - - - who is the "we" who should refuse to sign up for the cheap shops? How do you propose to organize shoppers and communicate with them not to take the "cheap shops?" The MS forum readers represent a very small percentage of the overall number of mystery shoppers. Even if every forum member refused shops for a specified period of time, I doubt that it would cause change. I think most forum members are more or less already refusing the cheap shops.

AND - - - - have we defined "cheap shop?" Cheap may be different to different shoppers.

No decent fee? Not doing it. Plain and simple.

Plain and simple? Canuck, how about if you had to eat on a route? How about if you loved their food? How about if it filled out a profitable route? How about if it had a generous reimbursement and you loved their food and it filled out a profitable route, during which you had to eat anyway? :-)

(heart)

stilllearning Wrote:
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> Plain and simple? Canuck, how about if you had to
> eat on a route? How about if you loved their food?
> How about if it filled out a profitable route? How
> about if it had a generous reimbursement and you
> loved their food and it filled out a profitable
> route, during which you had to eat anyway? :-)
>
> (heart)

But that's the problem here with identifying certain shops as "cheap shops" that "should" be refused. If a shop had a generous reimbursement and I loved their food, as far as I'm concerned, that would not be a "cheap shop" - it would be a shop with reasonable pay. If I were on a route and felt I had to eat, if the reimbursement allowed me to eat without putting out cash, and if I felt that was worth it (to ME!), then I would not consider it a cheap shop.

There's been no identification of what a cheap shop is. To me, any shop with pay/reimbursement that seems reasonable to me and meets my needs is not a cheap shop and it is one I will take. Any shop that does not seem reasonable to me gets deleted from my e-mail as quickly as it comes in.

I could not agree with you more! For starters, as you said, we would all have to agree on the definition of a "cheap shop" and then we would all have to agree to forgo all shops which fall into the "cheap" category. Unfortunately, it sounds like mission impossible to me! I would liken it to getting all Forum members to agree to go on a stringent diet for a month and promise not to cheat. (And I still have those dreamy chocolate covered turtles in my pantry, beckoning to me each time I open the door.)

(heart)

I can define a cheap shop. A cheap shop is a shop you want everyone else to ignore until the fee increases enough that YOU want to shop it.

I'm going to take the shops I want. I don't care what anybody else thinks about it.

stilllearning Wrote:
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> Plain and simple? Canuck, how about if you had to
> eat on a route? How about if you loved their food?
> How about if it filled out a profitable route? How
> about if it had a generous reimbursement and you
> loved their food and it filled out a profitable
> route, during which you had to eat anyway? :-)
>
> (heart)

I never, ever do eating shops on a route. That is a big no no
and one of my number one rules. Seasoned route shoppers know
exactly what I am talking about. Way too many variables
that could cause the rest of the day to not go as planned.

MDavis* nailed exactly what I have always suspected. People grouse about the people taking the cheap shops more because they want to do them for a bigger fee themselves, not because they want someone else to get them for a bigger fee.

If I forgo the local DQ for $4 (even though I want to eat there anyway and it's a 5 minute shop with a 6 question report) waiting for it to get up to $20, it doesn't help me if some flatlander comes up here and takes it for $10.

Everyone decides for themselves what a job is worth.

The grocery up here will get up to $25 if I leave it alone ... but last month someone took it for $4 plus the reimbursement. I don't get upset about it, I just go do other shops. Maybe they needed groceries more than I did.

dspeakes Wrote:
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> Everyone decides for themselves what a job is
> worth.
>
> The grocery up here will get up to $25 if I leave
> it alone ... but last month someone took it for $4
> plus the reimbursement. I don't get upset about
> it, I just go do other shops. Maybe they needed
> groceries more than I did.

Right there with you in terms of reaction, but regarding interpretation, I think it's more likely that whoever did your grocery shop for $4 simply did not know that it would go up to $25. Otherwise they'd have waited to take it until it hit $20.
I don't begrudge new (by "new" I mean ignorant, but with no pejorative intent) shoppers or the maybe-desperate shoppers their snatching up of pre-increase shops. I get frustrated that their actions generally drive down the prices in the future, but it's the system, not them. Indeed, I just wish that they knew enough to wait a bit - at least until after the first paltry increase. They'd make more money, and when they're out of rotation and I can get the shops, the prices will not be as low.
All the more reason to praise this Forum. The more people who learn the ropes, the better it will be for everyone.

Good thread folks!

dspeakes Wrote:
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> Everyone decides for themselves what a job is
> worth.

Exactly, and they decide for themselves what their time is worth, too. There are some on this forum who won't work for less than $20/hour, while other shoppers might be willing to work for minimum wage -- or less. Some folks may not have the luxury to pass up a low-paying job if it means the difference between eating or not. If I were unsure whether I could make rent next month, and if I were to have the chance to grab a local job for ten bucks, I would probably do so, rather than wait for a higher fee and risk losing that income to someone else who isn't so picky. My willingness to work for a low hourly rate would increase even more if it looked like I might not have money to buy food for my dogs. Or children. Or whatever.

I'm not saying this is the way things *should* be, of course, but desperate times call for desperate measures. The new economy has significantly increased the willingness of people to do more for less, I believe, and I think that has a lot to do with the stagnation (or decrease) of shop fees.

The OP sounds like she lives in California since she mentioned the minimum wage here. I did a coffee shop the other day for $4. I have not done one before as i was not interested in a $4 shop but it was quite pleasant and it forced me to take a needed break from my office job. I did notice however that there were at least 30 of that same job listed within my 15 mile radius when I signed up. I looked again the next day and they were all gone! These cannot possibly be only new shoppers taking these jobs. The decreased pay gas station shops people were complaining about a month or two ago had pages and pages of listings a few days ago and were all gone within two days. If these are all new shoppers and stupid shoppers then I live in a land where all my neighbors must be shopping and stupidly too. But then I am pretty sure the shopping climate in a big state like California must vary a lot from one location to another.

Wrong. When CORI was going strong rotations would have prevented me from doing all the shops. When all shoppers in the area were allowing fees to rise it kept the fees high month after month so we were all benefiting.

dspeakes Wrote:
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> People grouse about the people taking
> the cheap shops more because they want to do them
> for a bigger fee themselves, not because they want
> someone else to get them for a bigger fee.

I have cut my mystery shopping jobs down by around 50%. Too many shops are just not worth the time and gas.

stilllearning Wrote:
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> (And I still have those dreamy chocolate
> covered turtles in my pantry, beckoning to me each
> time I open the door.)

That is an easy fix...throw them in the trash.

Blasphemy!

I have done my share in NOT feeding the underpay MSC's....I do not work for companies with low pay, ever.
I work for several nice "Boutique companies", where fee is o.k. (not great), but certainly not a 3 or 4$ job, 15.00
to get in the car is my lowest. I just returned from a walk in Sausalito and noticed gas there is 4.87 and rising.

I agree with AustinMom, her post says it all.

That's what I do now. I have a limit except for unusual situations. I won't take most jobs for low pay. I just skip it. I am depending less and less on shopping income every year due to the lack of increased pay and the cost of gas.

There is always going to be a percentage of shoppers that will take the job at low pay. Some are new and don't know any better, some are simply that desperate because of the economy. If they need the money that badly, I am happy they are getting some income no matter how small.

Fees will never go up, so those that hold out seem to get jobs, and those that can't also get jobs.....it's a win win...

stilllearning Wrote:
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> I could not agree with you more! For starters, as
> you said, we would all have to agree on the
> definition of a "cheap shop" and then we would all
> have to agree to forgo all shops which fall into
> the "cheap" category. ...

As each of us represents an independent business it would be collusion/price fixing for us to collectively decide what a minimum should be. I looked into it. I even thought we might be able to unionize but the AFL-CIO did not agree. I have an email out to Actors' Equity to find out if we might be eligible for representation by this group. As Independent Contractors, we have no power to collectively bargain which is what I think we need to do. Anyway, that's just my $0.02.

I now do video shops nearly exclusively. They are a different kind of shop all together. Pay is much better in the video world. Video shoppers are in touch, often via phone, with the dozen or so schedulers who also specialize in this field, but I 'paid my dues' earning less than I should have for over 3,000 'written' shops and think ALL mystery shoppers should be paid better.

I am a lucky shopper because I shop when I want to and do not depend on shopping to survive. While I may not be a professional shopper like most on this forum, I do take each and every shop seriously. I take shops that only reimburse me for something I want or need. Most of the shops I end up with do not pay a fee. Even my haircut shop that I have been doing for over two years now is no longer paying a fee. I will still keep doing the shop anyway because it is worth it to me.

I did a vitamin shop a few months back because I needed vitamins. I do fine dining restaurants so I don't have to cook. I have done quite a few hotel shops recently because we were building a new home and the house we were renting for seven months was a dump and my husband and I needed to get away as often as possible.

I hate grocery store shops - only ever did one. Too many questions and too many people to see for the pay. Did an IKEA shop over a year ago because somebody on this forum said how great they were but I now suspect that poster must have been a desperate scheduler disguised as a shopper.

At the end of the year, no fees make it no income. Reimbursement of a job required expense does not add to the taxes. The mileage reduces the taxes we pay and what was reimbursed cost us nothing but my time writing a report.

So, I am one of those people who may have picked up someone else's "not worth it” shops but it was worth it to me.

Maybe we should think about starting a union of professionals.

We're too fragmented to unionize, even if we could, which I'm pretty sure we can't. (Alert Alert edit that! Several grammatical errors? An 8? OK then.) Unions are set up for employees, not contractors. Anyway, we could never collect dues, because there are no paychecks to hit and who do you think is going to send in a monthly payment on union dues?

Yes, I know we think a lot of these jobs don't pay enough. Apparently they do because someone is doing most of them at the starting price. Rest assured if the jobs don't get done, the fee will go up. That's how this works. Don't ask me to wait for higher fees because you want to wait for higher fees. Most of the time I'll jump on a starting to mid range fee. I'd rather do ten shops at $17 than three shops at $25. I get more money. It works better for me.

Thinking we can start a union and make it work is like hoping for lemon pie out of the sky. No. No way. We're on our own, each of us. Buckle up and buckle down and make this work if this is what you want to do. This is all individual effort. The team broke up and went home and they're not coming back.

Hurrah, what Mary says is so "right on", read and learn!!

MDavisnowell Wrote:
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> Thinking we can start a union and make it work is
> like hoping for lemon pie out of the sky.

Since the client hasn't been named, would you be willing to share which MSC shops lemon pie out of the sky?

Also, will the reimbursement at least cover the cost of the pie?

As an anti-union, pro-business shopper, I agree with Mary.

Omgee, thank you for adding a creative sense of humor to this thread.

While I've been watching the snow fall today, I've been reading the threads about mystery shopping.

IMO, it evens out. Sooner or later, those shoppers who take the low paying shops come to the realisation that their time and their gasoline is worth more than that low paying shop. I believe we've all been there - taking those shops when we first started and then had the "Oh" moment.

In my area, I see plenty of Steri BBB shops still scheduled for March, not taken. They haven't gone up enough for shoppers to bite. As for the ice cream shops, they're unhealthy (my opinion, I know) and too much trouble with the editors when reporting them.

I just wish I could find a wine or beer shop.

Well, yes, wine and beer are much healthier than ice cream. Hope you find lots of beer and wine shops but I love ice cream. I buy it in the big cartons so it comes in its own bowl. Now that's fast food for you.