Interesting side note. I received a call last night about a specific location that I have previously advised I will not do. When I said that I would not do the shop, the caller asked why. I said " Because I do not want to" and they asked for a better reason,,, I gave it to them, but it stuck in my craw. We are independent contractors with a right to choose not to accept ANY assignment. I have had issue with them in the past, and was advised to step back before pulling the plug. I am glad for this advice, because they really are a good company, but I was surprised by this interaction last night. I felt like a kid who got reprimanded for not eating my spinach.

Well, you should eat your spinach.

And one should not let a few incidents cloud your overall picture of the company. If this happened all the time, it's another story. But I don't get that impression fro your post.

Good on you for staying calm and cool.

You got a Scheduler that was near the end of the month and <fast food client> does not sell turkey dinners. The scheduler wanted the shop done.

You can understand when some of the locations are in neighborhoods suburban shoppers do not venture into on purpose. Obviously the original shopper saw their vehicle and dress and social status did not match and very wisely opted to drive by and live another day.

Market Force should warn newbies the shop is in an urban area. Caution should be exercised when selecting this shop.



Mod note: No need to identify the client here, as that is totally beside the point of the post.

I get a call from MF about a shop that is about 20 miles each way from my house and I tell them it is too far away, but they still call.. They ask why because they sometimes can offer more $$ to offset the reason.


But not for a bad area, I used to work for a company back in Boston and the delivery guys were all contractors. A few would not go to certain areas. Others would but we had to pay such a large bonus we actually lost money on the sale since they were not buying high end items. They said the reason was they had to have 2 additional people go with them to stay with the truck while making the deliveries, to avoid having the mattresses stolen out of the back of the truck, or the whole truck stolen.

One time one of my regular Marketforce schedulers called me and offered several bonused shops. As he was going through the list he saw a remote location I had done before but with a higher bonus. He mumbled something about trying to find out if he could offer more, then made the comment "but we don't want you to look greedy."

It really rubbed me the wrong way; he called me offering bonuses and I hadn't said anything about wanting more than he was offering. I really like this scheduler and I know he didn't mean anything derogatory with his remark, but to this day I cringe a little when I see him on caller ID.

You should have said, "I would take all the shops at the original rate, but we don't want Marketforce to look greedy."

I always say I can do it for an outlandish amount. They will come back with something reasonable, to which I reply, give me a call back when you can meet my request. TAKE NOTE - be prepared, my "outlandish" request has been met more than once and I have done the shop.

I had a call from a scheduler a few days ago and she asked me to do a shop I did before. She offered a bonus. I said I would not do it again because I did not like doing that shop. She asked, "Why not?" I said I was sorry but if I did not like a shop the first time, I never do it again.

The other call I received was from the other Market Force. The guy was so insistent because he said I was successful in doing it the first time, why did I not want to do it again. He said he was giving me a bonus. I said my partner did not want to do it again. He said I did not need a partner this time. I said I was really sorry but it was one of the shops I vowed never to do again. He raised his voice and said, "Well, how much bonus do I have to give you for you to do it?"

So you can be bought :-)
CureMS Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I always say I can do it for an outlandish amount.
> They will come back with something reasonable, to
> which I reply, give me a call back when you can
> meet my request. TAKE NOTE - be prepared, my
> "outlandish" request has been met more than once
> and I have done the shop.

I think a lot of times the schedulers don't know, or don't want to know, what is involved in a shop. For example, there is an Arches near me that was once the highest grossing Arches in the world (I think it is second now). I declined that shop time and again. I could not make the schedulers understand that not only will a bus be parked there, likely there will be 8-10 tour buses parked there. Unless it is a 6 a.m. breakfast shop, there will always be 8-10 tour buses parked there. That's why they are the second highest grossing Arches in the world. It's not possible to shop lunch or dinner there without tour buses, which in turn invalidates the shop.

Trendsource has some grocery shops that I would not do in a million years. Each of that chain's stores in my area has had at least one murder in its parking lot in the last year or so. The stores are gang infested. When you walk into any one of the stores, it smells like rotting, maggoty meat. Any food I bought from the deli or the meat case for the generous $8 allowance would go straight into the trash. Therefore, I refuse to risk my life and spend a minimum of 30-45 minutes in the store for almost a dozen interactions for the $5 fee. But the shops get done every month so someone is willing to do them!

There have been others that are in really dangerous parts of the big city or high crime areas. It is not greed nearly as much as it is safety sometimes.

I stopped doing MF's Arches shops because the route I was doing, which was heavily bonused ($320 for four shops) was very remote and I would camp overnight to get them done. I don't camp in the wilderness without my dogs. They stopped allowing the dogs to go through the drive thrus with me thus I stopped shopping them. I have no idea if the new person is getting the same bonuses, or even more. You can't touch a fleebag motel in the area for less than $100 a night and one that I would actually stay in is about $200 a night and they have to be done over a two-day period.

My point is that there are many reasons not to accept a shop and not all of them are economic.

I find it neither surprising nor offensive that an MF scheduler may ask for a reason why a shopper declines a shop. They ask the same question when you decline a shop on their web page, and it may help provide them useful feedback as to why a particular shop may be difficult to fill. As whiterosie pointed out, not all shops are declined purely for economic reasons.

Sometimes they ask why in case there is an objection they can manage. Need a different date or meal period? More money? Within reason, schedulers can make the deal. The overseas schedulers are more persistent, and if you can talk to someone in Georgia they can switch your profile to not be available for calls from overseas.

The calls from schedulers other than from Georgia? I always answer them. I always get what I want. Maybe it's because of my location in the boonies. I don't know. One scheduler offered me less than what I needed. I told her that was not possible. She had to talk to a supervisor and I got what I wanted. I guess they check your track record. I don't know.

Anyway, I'm just saying I always answer my phone. It always pays off.

Oh, btw..I often tell them to slow down. Or, I'll ask them how many cups of coffee they had. Speed freaks with a foreign accent is very hard to understand.

The reason the question surprised me is that the question has been answered at least 5 times in the past,, and each time they said they would take note of it. This is the reason I answered the way I did when the question was asked initially. There have been quite a few attempts to get me to do this location over the last month and a half. This is also why I was annoyed to have to answer it yet again, and I will probably need to answer it again in the future. I still felt like the person on the other end was under the impression that it was not my choice to decline the shop.

I had a very similar experience with MF.

I think those schedulers need more training. Who do they think they are anyway? It IS your choice to accept or decline a shop. Glad you stuck to your guns. Idiots!

Just go call today and they asked again about a shop out of my area 20 miles away and not near any place I usually go, but they ask me at least twice a month, never offer more for the distance I would go for 25.00 plus the food at 11.00 but not for less.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/01/2014 01:42AM by komondor.

Recently I received a phone call from a scheduler I couldn't understand due to his heavy foreign accent. I tried for a while and then said, very politely, "I'm sorry but I can't understand you and I don't know what you want. I'm going to hang up now. Goodbye." So this guy calls me right back and starts again. I wish Ugly Shopper had not jumped up and bit him, but that's exactly what happened.

I won't make that mistake again. The next time I get a caller I can't understand, I'm going to hang up without comment. Over and over. It makes more sense to wear them down than it does to wear myself down.

Don't worry, MDN--Ugly Shopper lurks in all of us...

I had Trend Source call one day about those parking lot jobs they can never fill and ask me to do four of them in a town 30 miles away. I said "thanks but no". She asked "why not?" I said "I don't want to". Again....WHY NOT???? WHY WON'T YOU DO THESE? I finally said "Because I don't have to, its not my job and have a nice day". this "you are not an employee" works both ways.

I have found schedulers to be chock full of information, but not always willing to part with it directly, so I find myself reading between the lines. When a scheduler says something like, "We don't want you to look greedy," my interpretation is I will likely not be eligible for any shops by this client if I reach a certain threshold. I thought I had been spotted as a shopper for one location and a scheduler who called me informed me I had done it too often. She had called me about the location and then could not assign it to me. That's when I learned why that shop did not show up on my list.

And if a scheduler asks 'why' it's likely because that scheduler wants to know what they can do to get that shop scheduled to you. They always seem to want be done with that phone call pretty quickly so it doesn't surprise me they might come across as abrupt from time to time.

RobinMarie Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> When a scheduler says something like, "We
> don't want you to look greedy," my interpretation
> is I will likely not be eligible for any shops by
> this client if I reach a certain threshold.

I always thought that was because I asked for too much $$$.