So a few months ago I signed up for Shadow a Shopper and used the free trial. I still had to put a PayPal card on file, but it says your CC will not be charged. Then I emailed them to downgrade my membership to free bronze status. Today I go to make a payment with my card and it's declined. I get gone and check PayPal and surprise to me, Shadow Shopper charged me 29.95 for their gold membership. I've contacted them and PayPal about this and hopefully they refund it ASAP as frankly they threw me off for my cell phone payment. Just wanted to warn anyone else who has their card on file to check and make sure they didn't charge you. If my card hadn't been declined I would not have noticed it for a while.

They do not refund. Their policy which you agreed to. I fought them for months also. good luck

Update, it turns out I was a member since 2005. When I resigned up they gave me a trial of gold membership in January 2014. Then I downgraded my account to bronze. They sneakily upgraded me to gold and used the card they had on file to bill me 29.95 for a new month of gold membership on April 9th. After several emails back and forth they refused to refund me even though I had dates to verify my side of things. The woman offered me a year of their wonderful service for the fee of 29.95 I declined and after realizing I would not get anywhere with them I called PayPal. PayPal refunded my money and said they have issues in the past with Shadow Shopper. They also blocked shadow shopper from being an able to bill me like that again. I gotta say PayPal went above and beyond today, and I left the associate great feedback with his manager. Shadow shopper on the other hand left me annoyed, they had the gal to tell me if I accept a few of their shops my membership pays for itself. That's poor customer service if you ask me.

Paypal has been great at getting refunds for me, also.

Paypal has always been great for me as well not just on mystery shopping but when I bought some (obviously) pirated DVDs on eBay and when there was fraudulent activity on my PP account. I was just about to sign up with Shadow - now i'm not so sure.

It should be pointed out
There is a SHADOW SHOPPER MSC which is very Legit'
and a
Shadow shopper newsletter scammy thing

I do NOT believe there Is any affiliation between the two

Is there a Shadow Shopper MSC? I know there's a Shadow Agency, but I haven't seen Shadow Shopper other than the one mentioned above with shady business practices.

what do they charge for?

They charge you to be a gold member. They are a good resource to learn about mystery shopping companies. Having applied for 73 shops through thier website abdonly ever getting one shop, I can say it doesn't help you get any shops. Heck, the one shopI got through them was never paid for.

So how far in advance do you have to cancel with Shadow Shopper to avoid the payment for the entire month? I don't know how I ended up with them, but they did a month trial for a discount. I noted on my calendar when a month would end. I have not found it to my advantage to be a member, other than finding new companies so sign on with. But with the list I found on the forum, I certainly don't need to pay $29.95 a month for their list.

I must ask:

Why in GOD'S name would you PAY to shop for a company?

You don't pay to shop for the company. It works like JobSlinger or JSPlus. Companies pay to reach additional shoppers who are not already on their list. SS emails the shoppers who are in the demographic margins of the shopper requirements.

For example, a scheduler at ACME MSC* needs 12 shoppers in Kalamazoo but the job has been posted for 3 days but may only have two shoppers in that area. They can post it on SS, who will then email it to all of SS's listed shoppers in Kalamazoo, even if they've never heard of ACME MSC.

That's why, if you're listed with SS, you will sometimes get emails from MSCs you've never heard of.

*hopefully there is no Acme MSC ;-D

The only time I will pay to shop is if the MSC requires a background check, i.e. Trendsource. Other than that, no way will I pay.

SunnyDays2 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I must ask:
>
> Why in GOD'S name would you PAY to shop for a
> company?

I would never pay to mystery shop, except possibly to get video shop training (which appears to be required before you can do any video shopping) or become MSPA certified. And I have done neither.

Hi all,
I am a newbie, only been mystery shopping for about a month and a half. So far I love it and I have to say I'm very pleased with BestMark and Market Force. I have to withhold on Intell-I-Shop and Trend (MSI) until next month and see if I get paid lol. I will say that for all four companies so far my communication with them has been pleasant and issues resolved right away.

However, my post is about Shadow Shopper. I signed up with Shadow Shopper (free) trying to get in to Mystery Shopping after years of false leads. When I found out they wanted money I wrote them off, however, I got two phone calls from companies that got my name from Shadow Shopper so just being registered with them has been a plus. Having said that, I agree "why would you pay to become a mystery shopper?" I can see if you want to get MSPA certified but even that is not necessary.

Unless you get something for referrals however, directing people to the MSPA website or Volition etc will give them a start on finding legitimate work at home companies.

By the way, I just signed up for this forum today and I am so glad to have found it, I have already found the comments to be invaluable. I don't take every complaint seriously but I do look for others who have had problems with the same company then I make my decision based on the problems they have had. If more than one person has had trouble getting paid from a company then I stay away from that company. There is good and bad in any job, it depends on what you can/will tolerate.

I don't direct people to the MSPA site or to Volition. Instead, I direct them to the link at the bottom of every page of this forum, "Official List of Mystery Shopping Companies."



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/31/2014 12:46PM by LisaSTL.

I have signed up for only about 70 or so companies and I already get an email directly from the MSC ahead of every job I can see in the teaser area of Shadow Shopper and refuse to give them a red cent.

They appear to me as a leech on the MS community. Why pay them, when you can go directly to the source shops and get the shops emailed to you first. It just puts you into a bigger pool of shoppers from what I can see. Many shops are only bonused in the direct emails and not on the boards from what I've seen already.

The website is too slick looking. Most times, the fancier the website is can be a direct reflection of the value of a service. A good business don't need to spend the time and expense to make the website look so nice. Graphic designer and web developer teams cost money. This is me wearing my very skeptical geek hat though. When I see a very fancy website, my internal radar goes off.

It's so misleading how they present the shops when not signed up. I'm comparing the emails I get from a MSC and then go there and see the same assignment the way they present it to non paying members.

The emails are relentless as well. I'm about to deactivate. I already have the "spam" going to a special folder with my email "rules" in Thunderbird.

Thunderbird in my opinion is better than Outlook with all the plugins and is compatable with Windows, Mac, and Linux. It's the same people that make Firefox if you didn't know. Also, there are plugins just like Firefox to enhance the abilities of Thunderbird.

Mabe I'll make a guide when I get my filtering rules all set up

[www.mozilla.org]

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/30/2014 11:33PM by scanman1.