What is their pay schedule?

If you completed your shop during this month... Payment processing begins month end (hits PayPal usually 3-5 after month end):
January..pays April
February... May
March... June
April... July
May... August
June... September
July... October
August... November
September... December
October... January
November... February
December... March

Payment Processing?
EVERY shopper must submit an invoice for services rendered. As a subcontractor it is your responsibility to submit a completed invoice to invoice@cirrusmktg.com. If you don't have an invoice, you should be given a copy of an invoice by your scheduler during your initial scheduler interaction ( PLEASE DO NOT SEND US YOUR SSN# until asked for). NEXT, your payment from Cirrus will be made through PayPal…no exceptions! We are very sorry but we are unable to issue hard-copy checks due to past fraudulent activities. Getting paid for an assignment depends solely on whether or not you completed the assignment correctly. To sign up for a PayPal account you can go to www.paypal.com. Once payment is processed, you will receive a notification from PayPal saying…"You’ve got money!”

After reading their payment processing, I deactivated my account! Way too long to process a payment! I can see a month after, but 3-5 months after, oh no thank you!

vw, they are on my 10 foot pole list as well. I asked someone there if she would work for a company that paid her four months after she did the work. She said that shoppers did it for extra money. Like that is a justification.

I will do shops for Cirrus on occasion. However, the payments puts them pretty low on the priority list. Still, if I have a window of time during which I want to work and don't see other appealing jobs available, I'll do their work. I figure that money in four months is better than no money at all. In my area, other MSC's offer very similar shops to theirs - and generally for $5 or $10 more than what Cirrus offers. So, why would I take $35 in four months for a job when I can get $45 next month for the same job? The way I see it is: If they need/want to have the slow payment processing, that's their business. However, if they want me to pick up their jobs, they need to offset it with higher pay than the competition.

I actually sent a nice note to the scheduler about two months ago, outlining just this and offering to pick up some of their shops that had gone unclaimed for several months for the same price as another MSC. I got not response at all. About a week ago, half of their shops suddenly had their compensation bumped up to the level I had requested. I did as many as I could - but some simply went undone from what I can tell. The other half were changed to phone-only shops.

I don't mind working for them - they are nice enough folks. It's just that I can't justify taking their shops when I can fill my time with better offers from other companies.

Having to wait 4 or 5+ months for payment is too long; however, you know their payment schedule when you sign up for the shop. I would be willing to wait that long for payment if their shops are priced right, but they aren't. The third strike is that shoppers say they have to chase down the payment. I don't take any shops from an MSC that has that reputation.

When I sign up with new MSCs, I wait until I receive payment for the first shop before I sign up for a second shop just in case they are an MSC that makes me chase a payment.

For future reference, there is a list of the payment dates of companies, [www.mysteryshopforum.com]

It is a sticky post (will always be at the top) at the thop of the Mystery Shopping Company Discussion.