Hi 'yallz!

Quick question -- if I got the good old DENIED stamp with a company and I later obtain a MSPA certification, is it possible to go back to that same company and say, "HEY! I got my certifications, hire me on!" ?

Or does it not work like that?

I understand taking the time energy and forking out the money to obtain your qualifications -- and all that -- looks good.

As of a while for me I was certified and the sites would verify. For the past 2 1/2 months sites no longer recognize the code. I've emailed MSPA numerous times, it took forever to get a response and pretty much just got a reply saying, "we're working on it." Still shows up as valid on the ones that accept it but the same number no longer does on others. So, my vote would be don't get the MSPA certification because what happened to me may end up happening to you.

I got this July 19th, still doesn't work. Emailed them beginning in June:

MSPA North America <messages@app.production.membersuite.com


Certification Validation Update

We appreciate your feedback and are aware of the issue with certification validation across several platforms and are working diligently to correct it.

We have been in discussions with the Associate Advisory Board, which consists of platform providers, scheduling companies and editing companies to streamline the current process as well as position it to accommodate future certifications. We will inform you once this process is complete.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused and we want you to know that MSPA North America is dedicated to providing value to all Independent Contractor members through our certification courses.

We look forward to continuing to serve and provide benefits to Independent Contractors, which are a very important segment of the Association.

Thank you for your patience!

MSPA certification is fine, but as a general rule, it doesn't make a lot of difference when registering with companies. I don't know of any who limit registrants to certified shoppers. I would say if you were turned down by a MSC it probably had nothing to do with not being certified. Getting certification would probably not change their mind. I could be wrong, depending on the company.

@MysteriousLurker wrote:

Hi 'yallz!

Quick question -- if I got the good old DENIED stamp with a company and I later obtain a MSPA certification, is it possible to go back to that same company and say, "HEY! I got my certifications, hire me on!" ?

Or does it not work like that?

I understand taking the time energy and forking out the money to obtain your qualifications -- and all that -- looks good.

I think it doesn't work that way. If you were denied, you were denied. I'm pretty sure you weren't denied because you lacked certification. I learned about mystery shopping from a family member who had been shopping.a couple of years. She had the Silver, which I think has been discontinued but at that time cost $15. She advised me not to bother with it, so I didn't bother.

I started shopping in 2009 with no certification and I still have no certification. I've never been denied by a company so far. I'm signed up with about 100.

What was the reason you were denied?

JayC,
Was your application to join denied or was a shop payment denied?

@walesmaven wrote:

JayC,
Was your application to join denied or was a shop payment denied?

No, it wasn't me - it was Mysterious Lurker who was apparently denied. He posted in two other places that he was denied by Market Force and Intellishop, but I don't know which one he is talking about here, or if he is talking about another company than those two.

I didn't know either Intellishop or MF would deny a registration. Isn't there only a handful of companies who actually look at an application before deciding to take on an IC?

@LisaSTL wrote:

I didn't know either Intellishop or MF would deny a registration. Isn't there only a handful of companies who actually look at an application before deciding to take on an IC?

I never heard of Market Force denying an application before. But mysteriouslurker posted on another thread that he was denied by Intellishop because he failed their test.

I've never had a company tell me they were denying me as a shopper. Rather what they do is just not respond. I can't imagine that the OP was turned down by any company because of a lack of certification or I would likely have run into that as well. If the OP was flat denied, I suspect there was rather some screw up with the application because even if they have plenty of shoppers now, no company knows what their shopper population or client load will look like 6 months from now. I had my registration in with BestMark for more than a year before they suddenly sent me login credentials because they had clients in my area.

@LisaSTL wrote:

I didn't know either Intellishop or MF would deny a registration. Isn't there only a handful of companies who actually look at an application before deciding to take on an IC?

This was the email I got from MF

"Good morning,

We appreciate your interest in our company. Market Force has very different criteria for independent contractors than most other mystery shopping companies have, and we actually only offer shopping opportunities to about 65 percent of applicants.

Because we consider our screening process to be confidential, we cannot release our criteria to applicants, mystery shoppers, or any other outside source. We wish you continued success with your other Mystery shopping Companies."

65% ..lol

That's sure news to me. This is the first time I have ever heard that MF offers shopping opportunities to only 65 percent of applicants. I actually have NEVER heard of anyone else being turned down by MF. I thought all applications were automatically accepted by MF.

Were you turned down by MF before or after Intellishop removed you when you had problems with the test? Just curious if your name might be posted on a list of suspicious mystery shoppers or something. The schedulers have a private scheduler forum on the Volition forum where they talk about shoppers and they name names.

After.

Oh weird.... isn't that like against the law or something? Privacy issues or such? May need to look into it..............

Edit: I call complete full of dog @#$%& with her email.

If they really want to vet me, they can call Best Mark and Barb from KSS and they can tell those clowns what awesome work I do.... I have a rating of 9....pretty darn good if you ask me!

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/26/2016 06:56PM by MysteriousLurker.

No, it would not be against the law for a scheduler to post on a scheduler forum what happened with a shopper, mentioning the shopper's name. You posted on a shopper forum, naming Intellishop and Market Force. Do you believe that it was against the law for you to reveal the company names and information about your interaction with them? Now, if the companies revealed your SS# or address, there might be privacy issues. But it would not be against the law for a scheduler or company official to report to others her experiences with you.

True. You're right.

Sorry.. had a bitter and angry moment again. I'm about as grouchy an old man who keeps forgetting to take his meds and change his depends.

You may mean Kinesis instead of KSS.

MSPA changed their certification system many months ago. It appeared that they were trying to eliminate Silver certification and replace it with a certificate called something like Basic Mystery Shopping. That change has prevented my certification code from being accepted into my profile by most if not all MSC's I have registered with since MSPA's system change.

I have contacted MSPA for months about this problem. Based upon the results to date, it is ridiculous for them to say that "We appreciate your feedback and are aware of the issue with certification validation across several platforms and are working diligently to correct it." It seems to me that they either lack the resources or do not care about correcting this annoying problem. Results would show a commitment to fix the issue. Boilerplate responses to members do not.

I experienced this months-old problem again tonight and, against my better judgement, thought I would ask MSPA one final time (my email is shown below) to address this issue. MSPA's certification has probably not been worth the time I have spent on this matter.

Is anyone else having trouble getting your Silver Certification code accepted into your profile at the MSC's?


"Dear MSPA,

Since changes involving Silver certification were made several months ago, I and MSC's' that I have registered with since that time continue having trouble getting my Silver certification number (CERT #) accepted into my profiles. The current instance of this ongoing problem is with my profile at **MSC**. Even though my profile on your website shows that I am Silver certified, **MSC**'s profile for me will not accept my (CERT #) entry. I get referred to a document that describes a process for correcting this problem. I have completed your process and it fails to resolve the issue.

I have contacted you multiple times in the past about this issue. So far, you have failed to correct this problem for me and the several MSC's that have been involved. You have stated that it is the responsibility of companies such as **MSC** to modify their systems to be compatible with your changes.

Please take the steps necessary to repair your system so that it works as smoothly as it did not too many months ago.

Best,
Sherm Benson



Dear **MSC** support,

Would you please manually enter my MSPA Silver Certification number, (CERT #), into my profile. I have no experience with MSPA that gives me confidence that this problem will be corrected. Thank you.

Best regards,
**MSPA Silver Certified Shopper**"

Do the certifications help you get more job offers? I've thought about getting certified, but if the job opportunities are the same, regardless...

Not illegal to name names... but it wouldn't be so great if they were libeling (libel?) your name...

I have gold level certification.

[www.bbb.org]

Anyhow, click on positive reviews and NOTICE how they are obviously WRITTEN by the same person with the same grammar and random CAPS everywhere.

They have something like a monopoly. I regret paying them. I wish another certification company would emerge. I absolutely did not get what I paid for and their customer service is worse than Comcast.

IMSC offers a lot of free online MS training and certifications. All Shopmetrics sites are happy to accept IMSC certifications.

Reply removed for editing.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/02/2016 02:32AM by sdbens2.

clinen11, not sure what you mean.

@clinen11 wrote:

Not illegal to name names... but it wouldn't be so great if they were libeling (libel?) your name...

Oh trust me. I'll find out. There are ways. I can have it done by 3pm tomorrow afternoon. Besides, my name -- my last name is VERY unique. Plus I am Roman Italian. That should tell you everything right there. (Hell, I've even been accused of being in the Italian Mafia too, which I just laugh off. LOL!) I am 1000000% no nonsense when it comes to my good name being misused in ANY way.

Anyways, that's not the point. Having a great day today. I'm out and about in this hurricane... I got some price gougers today and I am watching a bartender shove money down her bra. So entertaining.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/02/2016 02:48AM by MysteriousLurker.

@FlawnMawn wrote:

I have gold level certification.

[www.bbb.org]

Anyhow, click on positive reviews and NOTICE how they are obviously WRITTEN by the same person with the same grammar and random CAPS everywhere.

They have something like a monopoly. I regret paying them. I wish another certification company would emerge. I absolutely did not get what I paid for and their customer service is worse than Comcast.

"Page not found"

Hello all, I just bought and completed the "Intro to Mystery Shopping". Can someone please tell me if I can enter the MSPA certification code into my profile for all of the MSP's I shop for? I don't see a Silver certification available on the MSPA website-what exactly is the Silver? Thank you in advance.

Aaaand, none of the MSC's are recognizing it, of course.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/02/2016 07:56AM by silverchic78.

Lurker,

I just clicked on it and it works for me. Then click on the + next to positive reviews.

Now it works. I was using a different source for internet. Maybe that's what happened. My apologies


Who were you referring to anyways? Those reviews are pretty entertaining.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/02/2016 03:30PM by MysteriousLurker.

MSPA who provide the gold/whatever certification.