I have the same problem as you. Your best bet is to search by city. Not all of those hotel shops have the associated spa. You could also write in the comment box that if a spa is available that you would be interested. I have found that work for me on one occasion.

Due to issues with the search function, I have manually read through the 2000+ entries on more than one occasion to see what is available overseas!

Anyone ever opt for a few points deduction just to get to take home leftovers? Often times, I don't finish the meal. Wish they would just allow us to take the leftovers home!

Wow! No, Linda. I wouldn't! I mean, to each their own, but I hadn't ever thought of that, I assumed the penalty would be larger, I try to keep my score as close to perfect, and it also makes it a higher risk you are found out as a shopper.

In a lower tier restaurant, it is fairly common to bring home leftovers. But at the top tier $50 an entree places, diners typically don't bring their food home.

I have sent at least 4 emails to the Coyle scheduler as well as customer support and no one responds. Time is now crucial as I want to move the date up one day from my scheduled shop and I do not know if that is OK to do.

I brought home a fish taco once, unintentionally. They served three. We had an appetizer, three fish tacos, side dish and a dessert. Plus a drink at the bar. I didn't mean to, I just forgot. It wasn't a top line place.

In those top tier places usually, the entree is not even enough to make me full, let alone take anything home. Unless it's a steak house. However, with appetizer and dessert, I'm good!

I don't think it's the price range that discourages diners from taking it home. If I paid $50 for a dish and I could not finish it, I would definitely take it home. I'm a pretty big eater so I don't normally have any leftovers, so I have not been in that situation too often.

@laur371 wrote:

In a lower tier restaurant, it is fairly common to bring home leftovers. But at the top tier $50 an entree places, diners typically don't bring their food home.

I've been working pretty consistently for Coyle since the summer of 2014. I probably do about 1 high end hotel a month for them and 4-6 restaurants- but I live in New York where there are a glut of those.

Despite that aside from a sojourn into nearby New Jersey and once into Massachusetts I've never traveled on Coyle's dime, and I see hotels and restaurants in far flung locations like Africa or Sri Lanka sitting on the boards for months if not years. How can I start doing international shops with Coyle, or would they just absolutely refuse to pay airfare to these destinations and hope that someone local takes them?

Furthermore, is it considered presumptuous to email a scheduler after applying for a shop (particularly something highly desirable like a high end hotel) to let them know you, personally are interested? I normally just apply for everything at the start of the month and let things trickle in, because I'm worried saying "I really want French food sometime next week" or "I need to get away from the house the weekend of the 9th, can you put me up in a hotel?" might come across as presumptuous.


EDIT: With regard to taking things home or not; I understand it's a blanket rule for all of their locations, particularly the high end ones... but oftentimes there's a question on the form that asks explicitly whether or not the wait staff offered to wrap up your leftovers! If the staff are offering to send you home with a doggie bag I think it's okay. Once earlier in my career I had lunch at an Italian restaurant for Coyle- and I say Italian because the portions were huge and the manager was incredibly gregarious and friendly. And I had to have a full three courses of lunch. I could barely touch my main course, and when it came time for the pizza, the manager either enjoyed my company so much (or may have been hitting on my mom- my guest- it's not entirely easy to be sure) that he gave us a free slice of cheesecake on top of what we ordered. Each time the staff came by and realized we could barely pack away the food they kept asking if we wanted to take it away and I felt incredibly conspicuous for refusing.

I could also go on a rant about their "no filet mignon or lobster" rule but I don't want to list out all of the other even more luxurious foods I am allowed to order for fear that they might crack down on those, too.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/17/2016 10:22PM by Misanthrope.

I don't know about now... but a long time ago, when the score was up to 20, I did take food home once. Just like the above poster, there was so much food that it was going to be awkward for me to decline.

I ended up getting 19/20. After that, I have tempted on many occasions... one point off for a nice lunch the following day! Perhaps an insider point of view (Steve) could give us an idea how seriously they take that rule

Question: When it comes to the xxx hotels (for example) the dates run all the way until October. When applying for those shops, if available pretty much any time to travel, how would you go about applying? Should I put each individual date up until October or by weeks?

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/18/2016 12:31AM by ashjam72069.

@ashjam72069 Since this thread is about a particular mystery shopping company, you need to remove the name of the hotel chain.

It's never awkward not to take a doggy bag from a fine dining establishment. Many people who dine at those types of places would never dream of taking leftovers home and in fact would find it awkward to do so!

I prefer to make it a point to save enough food to eat the next day, but there have been plenty of times when I have left food on the plate to go into the restaurant's garbage: I'm traveling, or leaving for a trip the next day, or heading directly to another event and I don't want the food to sit in the car, and so on. Or, I just didn't love it and I don't want to eat any more of it.

It's June 17, and I still have 3 shops in application with Coyle. It was still sitting there so I assume it was not assigned to anyone else. Does Coyle intend to just let these shops go unfilled because their favorite shopper did not show up yet?

I know I'm not the only one in this boat, but while Coyle has occasionally had hotels in my general area, they never have restaurants. I'm noticing that there now seem to be many more hotels that are not "high tier" and don't seem to have very complicated reports. Do I have a chance at getting any of those in the interest of building experience? I do have a fair amount of hotel experience with other companies, including multi-day resort visits with very long narrative reports. I know that other experience doesn't usually mean anything to Coyle, but I'm wondering if they might be loosening their expectations for these lower-paying evaluations.

I have just started applying for shops with them in the last week or so, and my first assignment is a hotel. There usually isn't much else in my general area, though. Seems like a fairly easy shop for the pay.

Ok, so... I shopped my first restaurant. Afyer sitting at the bar I was approached by someone I worked with for a few years. Turns out she is the bartender. Because of that, I did not receive typical service, was unable to meet certain objectives, etc. I had no way of rectifing things without being extremely odd and suspicious. I continued the shop but I think it will be inpossible to be impartial. I emailed support and am hoping for an answer soon, I had no idea this person worked there. What should I expect? If I don't get an email back before the survey is due, should I try to complete the report anyway?

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/21/2016 06:52AM by MegMeg.

I had something similar happen recently. I emailed my scheduler as soon as I got home. I was unable to use the shop and have to wait until the person no longer works there to return to that location. My MSC actually did pay me for the effort, but I'm sure that is not the norm. My problem was that timings and required greetings/upsells were thrown off. Maybe they will still be able to use yours. If you don't hear back in time, you should go ahead and submit the shop. Good luck!

How do you see your score on a report? I completed my first shop for them a few weeks ago, was emailed one simple question & replied. The shop shows "ok to pay" but I was never emailed a score or feedback and can't find it on the shopmetrics site. I completed another two shops this past weekend but they are still pending validation.

@luckygirl0100 I usually get an email with subject "Your mystery shop results" The email then breaks everything down and is graded on a yes / no in the first section and then a % grade for the second section. Maybe it went to your spam?

@aayaey wrote:

@luckygirl0100 I usually get an email with subject "Your mystery shop results" The email then breaks everything down and is graded on a yes / no in the first section and then a % grade for the second section. Maybe it went to your spam?

Thank you and nope, no email. I check my spam every day. When I replied to the editors email I got an automated email telling me the editor was on vacation for a week, but then two days later it showed as "ok to pay".

I had a similar thing happen on a Coyle shop and they took the report and paid.

@MegMeg wrote:

Ok, so... I shopped my first restaurant. Afyer sitting at the bar I was approached by someone I worked with for a few years. Turns out she is the bartender. Because of that, I did not receive typical service, was unable to meet certain objectives, etc. I had no way of rectifing things without being extremely odd and suspicious. I continued the shop but I think it will be inpossible to be impartial. I emailed support and am hoping for an answer soon, I had no idea this person worked there. What should I expect? If I don't get an email back before the survey is due, should I try to complete the report anyway?

@aayaey wrote:

Q: When I clear the zip and my city, it brings up a whole lot of shops, but how do u narrow down to just one country?

A: This is more of a Shopmetrics issue than a Coyle issue, but there are a number of things you can do to narrow the available assignment listings.

The first thing you need to understand is that Shopmetrics is just not set up well to handle the international clients, so until the software has been modified to allow for that, you have accept some workaround to find the assignments. It will not do a good job at the current time of narrowing it down to one country.

My suggestion is; Remove the ZIP, city and state from the search window. Select the client you are looking to evaluate from the "Survey" field and then allow the maximum number of results. If you click the "Location" tab at the top of the search window it will group the shops by area, and you quickly see if there's one in the area you are going to.

I also keep another tab open with Goggle maps in a neighboring window where I can copy and paste the address for the available assignments. You can quickly see the precise locations and read reviews about the clients that way.

If it seems like too much work in order to locate an assignment in the country you are going to, understand that in the course of evaluating properties oversees, that may be the least of the hassles you encounter, so please request assignments with that in mind.

Q: What's the deal with the "no leftovers" and "no filet mignon or lobster" rule? (I'm paraphrasing)

A: These rules were put in place to make sure the clients do not feel taken advantage of, and to bring variety to the reports. Expense limits are generally set to allow for an average priced meal. Unfortunately, before these rules were in place, some evaluators would order the least expensive meals possible, and then order additional food that was not even consumed at the restaurant, and take it home. Another group of evaluators would consistently order filet mignon and lobster only.

For obvious reasons, the clients were not happy with the reports so rules had to be put into place. Same thing goes for "no Eggs Benedict". Without that rule, over 75% of shoppers will order Eggs Benedict for breakfast.

If the report has a standard for servers offering to wrap leftovers, you can just simply report of it was offered, or mark it n/a if there were no leftovers.

@ashjam72069 wrote:

Q: When applying for those shops, if available pretty much any time to travel, how would you go about applying? Should I put each individual date up until October or by weeks?

A: This is a general answer for everyone asking about shop applications. If you put something like "any day" or list a date range, there is an EXTREMELY good chance your application will be ignored. My advice is to put a specific date that you can do the shop, and perhaps one alternate.

If you put an application in and don't immediately get assigned, understand there are a multitude of reasons why that may be happening. I have heard that for the major hotel client, they are overbooked for June, so don't expect a request for June to get filled. I also know that they want to get the assignment done as early in the quarter as possible, so conversely a request for the last possible week it's allowed will also probably sit and not get assigned. They scheduler also has to allow for when the editors will be available. If a particular week has too many assignments, that will overload editorial and everything gets behind, so the assignments must be spread out as much as possible over the allowed dates, with the understanding that the lest few weeks of that period will be spend handling the hard-to-scedule properties.

Short answer: Your desired travel dates may just not line up with the client or MSC needs. In that case, you are not the best choice for the assignment. It's not personal. It's just the business of scheduling thousands of hotel stays. I have a bunch of hotel requests that have been sitting for weeks. I put it on my calendar and if something better comes up, I take that and remove the request...

@SteveSoCal wrote:

Q: What's the deal with the "no leftovers" and "no filet mignon or lobster" rule? (I'm paraphrasing)

A: If the report has a standard for servers offering to wrap leftovers, you can just simply report of it was offered, or mark it n/a if there were no leftovers.

Hi Steve -

Even if the report has the standard, I think they expect you to stay no... One time, I accepted the leftovers and I got dinged... They could have a policy like A Closer Look where it is okay to take home what's left, rather than ordering extra to take home.

@SteveSoCal wrote:

@ashjam72069 wrote:

Q: When applying for those shops, if available pretty much any time to travel, how would you go about applying? Should I put each individual date up until October or by weeks?

Steve, a follow up question to your thoughtful response (and again, this may be more of a Shopmetrics issue)--

I have applied for a bunch of dates for a few hotel shops. I want to edit / add to the list of dates on my application, since my schedule has changed since applying a month ago. How do I do this? I assume I cancel application and then re-apply, but I am fearful that if I cancel, the shop won't re-appear and/or it will look like my application came last so I will not be considered. Are my concerns valid? How do you handle?

Thank you!

@luckygirl0100 wrote:

How do you see your score on a report? I completed my first shop for them a few weeks ago... The shop shows "ok to pay" but I was never emailed a score or feedback...

This has been the case for me for every shop I've done for them so far. I simply emailed support asking for my grades and they sent them over promptly.

This thread is awesome! Thank you so much Steve for taking the time to answer our questions. Now I have one

My next fine dining shop requires a bar visit but does not require ordering alcohol. I asked support about this and they confirmed; you can order a non alcoholic drink, such as a mocktail, juice, soda, or coffee. Additionally, you can order alcohol and just not consume it by throwing it away in the restroom if needed.

Can anyone offer insight about ordering something other than alcohol for a bar evaluation portion of a restaurant shop? It seems odd to me, possibly suspicious, to go to a bar without ordering alcohol, but they assured this would fine.

Is your guest ordering alcohol? If so, then it is not weird at all. I often order a soda when my girlfriends order an alcohol drink (when I am not mystery shopping), just for health reasons! Not odd at all.

Now if you are both ordering no alcoholic drinks, it is also fine, but slightly less normal, so make sure you are inconspicuous otherwise! Maybe order something a bit fancier (like a fancy coffee or fancy mocktail), as opposed to a diet coke.

I'm wondering about this in the event that neither of us order alcohol at the bar, which is acceptable for this shop. I agree it seems not very normal, so I may not attempt it, but I'm very curious about this scenario.

@gojiberry wrote:

I'm wondering about this in the event that neither of us order alcohol at the bar, which is acceptable for this shop. I agree it seems not very normal, so I may not attempt it, but I'm very curious about this scenario.

If you're doing the bar before the dinner, I would just casually make a comment to the bartender, as they're handing you a menu, "We're waiting on a couple more for dinner. Could I just get a diet?" or something to that effect. It provides you a plausible excuse to be waiting at the bar. I've done this multiple times without a problem. If the questions are similar to the ones I've completed, you'll want to make sure you give the bartender a chance to make suggestions before you order, but I've never had an issue executing the scenario this way before.