Very well put, chigirl777. And thanks for getting us back on track.

@chigirl777 wrote:

I thought several posters were just trying to be helpful by recommending to make a note of the confirmation number, screen shot, etc. I admit that sometimes I too fail to capture this information, which as you've unfortunately learned the hard way can be risky.

I think the problem was worse because the OP said there was NO confirmation number. She believed she had gotten a "submitted" screen but said that it did not contain a confirmation number.

Exactly, and that's where a screen shot would have been helpful. And on STN's platform, there is a link you can click just after submission to print an invoice or something like that. But again - I am not as diligent about this as I should be - this could just as easily have happened to me, so I am NOT criticizing.

You actually can also click a link and print your report or save it to pdf. Or have they changed that and the option to print/save the report is no longer available?

I used to work for them quite a bit when they had a couple of clients I liked. They lost the clients and I haven't worked for them in well over a year. Their current clients don't interest me and their pay is not at all tempting.

I don't recall one way or the other about a pdf option on their site, but I suppose you could just right click and print to the printer of your choice. In this case, I would send it to the pdf printer option, which you could really do for any web page. Not sure about the formatting though, since I don't typically do that. Maybe I should start taking my own advice.

I don't do much for STN either - just recently completed 2 tax preparer audits that were actually enjoyable and paid well. Other than those, I hadn't worked for them since 2013.

I like working for STN, however as others here have said you will find a few bad eggs within all companies. I know for a fact that they have one scheduler, whoes name I shall not mention, for fear of being blackballed that isn't very nice. This person is rude at best. All the other people I work with are more then willing to help you out in anyway they can.

And you can forget about speaking to anyone on the phone. You know that help line you are suppose to call? Well, the person I am speaking of called me once and said, " don't call that phone number because no one is there to answer the call" Me, "Why do you have a help line phone number if no one is there to answer it".

I try to avoid this scheduler at all cost, I just figured we got off to a bad start after my first few shops with them. I have come a long way. At this point I have no problems with them. We all have learning curves to over come when we start something new in life.

As far as submitting your reports to them. I always print my shop received report that contains the report along with a confirmation number. Then I make sure to check on the status of that report every day until it goes to the payment pending stage.

I hope this helps you a little. I'm not one to give others a lot of advice since I'm still a baby in this field.

Happy Shopping!

In closing I do want to add one more thing. Out of all the companies I do work for I enjoy working with STN, just keep a check on the shops you submit, after all it's not their place to make sure your shop reports are in, it's yours!

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/22/2015 07:08PM by margaretbella.

Have I mentioned lately that I really hate this company?

Hmmmm...maybe I've been lucky as I have done many, many assignments for STN and have never had any kind of issue. I've found the schedulers to be friendly and proactive and nope, I don't work for STN.

So do not shop for them. Problem solved.

@bgriffin wrote:

Have I mentioned lately that I really hate this company?

I have been working with STN more then usual lately and haven't had any problems. I'm thinking you may have just not hit it off with one of their people. It happens! Sometimes more then others. Are you having this problem with just one person? or more then one?

Take a deep breathe and try not to let it upset you. Keep your eye on the prize, the pay check. I'm thinking we all have monents like this, in the end it isn't worth lossing sleep over.

Everyone here knows I'm a newbie at this but I'm thinking rather then constantly bad mouthing STN just don't work for them. As someone else here has already suggusted. Personaly I enjoy working for them. But if and when I have this kind of attitude about them or any other company I'll stop working with them.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/09/2015 12:29AM by margaretbella.

Yes, that was my problem. I took the bait of a big bonus and remembered why I don't work for them.

I just read this thread today and from what I could make out, the OP said that STN CALLED him a liar and I agree. He stated the the CSR stated that he did not submit the report. I am reminded on occasions when my spouse tells me something when I am just out of earshot range and I say that she didn't SAY it. I called her a liar because she did say it but I didn't hear it. If I had said that I didn' t hear it, then that is different from saying she didn't say it and she has a right to be upset. The OP stated several times that STN said that the shop wasn't SUBMITTED and if indeed it was submitted then they are saying the OP was lying. May not be a big deal to most, but where I'm from those are fighting words. MSC have an obligation to give shoppers benefit of the doubt until proven otherwise.

I think the issue might be that the OP believed she had submitted the report, but she had not. After completing the report, the OP did not get a confirmation number which would indicate that the report wasn't submitted.

I do NOT agree with the title of this thread but I just completed a report for STN this morning. After completing the report and uploading the photo of the purchase receipt, I kept on getting a "technical difficulty" message. I also got a message saying that the POV was not there when I could physically see the photo in the report. I even reattached a second photo at a different size just in case.

My Dashboard says that the report is "in process" but I never got any kind of confirmation number. Not all MSCs and reporting systems give a confirmation number. Are you people sure that STN gives one?

Of course they are closed for the weekend but I sent an email to my scheduler and another email to the Help Desk with a copy of the error message that I received. I also printed a hard copy of my report, saved a copy on my computer and printed my invoice. At this point, I think I have done all that can be done.

But once again, are you 100% sure that STN gives confirmation numbers for completed reports?

I have gotten confirmations after submitting with STN. After getting the confirmation, I always make a pdf copy of the report and save it. Having said that, I work for them very little. Unless bonused, I find their shops not worth it.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/14/2015 10:47PM by AustinMom.

Well I just got a decent bottle of French wine on sale and with the flat rate fee, I maybe paid $2-something extra out of my own pocket. That is worth it for me.

I just wanted to say that STN was really, really good for me last week. This isn't a comment on this particular situation in the OP, but just a general praise for STN. I did a shop for STN, got sick and ended up in the hospital. I was too sick to even think about contacting my schedulers and asking for extensions. By the time I thought of it, STN had already pulled the shop and put it back on the job board. I contacted the scheduler, and she reassigned it to me and let me submit it (I did not expect her to, I was really just emailing her to explain). We are talking about three days overdue, not a couple of hours. I thought it was pretty awesome of her, anyway!

Im a newbie I love this company! Havent received my payment yet but they pay between 15th and the 25th I believe so they have time but they have given me some HUGE bonuses for shops and have been so nice to me! Hopefully they pay on time but so far I have had many positive experiences with them.

Not sure if this was mentioned already: STN has system maintenance pretty early some or maybe all nights, at like 11:00 Central. They don't really have a good way to show this on their website - sometimes it just stops working or does weird stuff around that time. Their help desk is pretty kind about it. Once I couldn't do a report at all, got to be pretty late with the system still down and they said no prob, just do it the next day. Tuesday night I submitted a report and it got put in the "requires attention" list but clicking showed no errors. Help desk emailed back next morning that I had got burned by the system maintenance and they had cleared the error. Overall they're good to work with. The $1 fee for Paypal payments is a bit much, though.