I think I got a few questions lined up now....

1. Is it Dishwasher safe? I eat lots of Doritos.

2. I can only dial the phone numbers if I see the numbers lined up like 123, 456, 789, *0#. I dial them without thinking about the numbers. Where are the Number buttons at?

3. Does it have Dialtone? I like listening to the dialtone. I know it's going to work that way.

4. Does it come in Gold? I really like shiny things!

scanman1 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I think I got a few questions lined up now....
>
> 1. Is it Dishwasher safe? I eat lots of Doritos.

Brilliant! Now you've got it!
I am totally using that the next time they tell me it's water resistant!

LOL, but ..... rule #1... don't be memorable!

But I love that question.... dishwasher safe.... but might actually be plausible to ask if it could handle a trip through a clothes washer. I put my mifi device through the washer once. (It still worked, too.)

My grandson recently took his expensive Iphone, put on the new waterproof cover his mom bought and threw it in the pool. Needless to say, he put the cover on wrong.

shopper8 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My grandson recently took his expensive Iphone,
> put on the new waterproof cover his mom bought and
> threw it in the pool. Needless to say, he put the
> cover on wrong.

sigh. That would be just my luck.

I was doing a Verizon audit the other day saw these plastic bags that are supposed to protect a tablet in a pool or bathtub.

Looked like a $20 Ziploc bag to me.

Im a tech nerd but when I do these types of shops I play the role of someone who is totally non-tech.

I even tell the people I know nothing about phones/tech, its easier to ask basic questions.

As a tech nerd its actually interesting/fun to hear some of the answers you get to basic questions.

It becomes pretty obvious quite quickly if someone knows what they are talking about or are just feeding you a line of BS to get a sale.

So let me ask you, dwater, where are the number buttons??

(heart)

dwater Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Im a tech nerd but when I do these types of shops
> I play the role of someone who is totally
> non-tech.
>
> I even tell the people I know nothing about
> phones/tech, its easier to ask basic questions.
>
> As a tech nerd its actually interesting/fun to
> hear some of the answers you get to basic
> questions.
>
> It becomes pretty obvious quite quickly if someone
> knows what they are talking about or are just
> feeding you a line of BS to get a sale.

I used to toy with the new sales people at Microcenter and Fry's when they would come up to me, just for the sport of it. I'd ask them a question, and if they got it right, I'd up the difficulty a notch and keep going till I "broke them". Then I'd smirk and laugh and let them off the hook and explain to them what the answer is to the question they failed at. I was shocked when I ran into a few nerds that played the game up to the point I was asking about hot swapping raid5 drives and extremly advanced questions.

In the end, I made some friends that worked at both stores and they let me drain thier employee discount in exchange for me building a PC for them or other arrangements. (Both are PC repair and build shops)

As employee's they would rather I build thier PC and tweak the OS and overclock it, than have the butchers that work in repair center touch thier box.

I even won over the manager at Fry's and had his business card and could call him on his cell and then meet up with him wherever he was in the store and haggle open box stuff to way below his cost/loss if it was missing a needed part to get it out of the store so it didnt have to be sent back and I'd get the missing part from the manufacturer and sell it on ebay for a nice profit. (Think 20% of normal price).

I'd sweet talk the manufacturer to send me the missing parts for free 99% of the time.

I had my own style of crazy shopping long before I ever heard of mystery shopping.

You can Haggle over pricing. Only the store manager of a big box can overide most times, but if you are shopping a big item, and ask for the store manager and give him a take it or leave it price, he WILL go to a POS system and run the numbers and stock availability, and if he has enough stock, and you clear the min. profit margin that corp allows him to overide, he will do the overide and allow you to haggle. Only the Manager can do that at all stores I tried this at. If he's out, the assistant manager cant do it. It's almost non heard of in the USA to haggle, to the point the drone employees won't even direct you to the manager when you start haggling.

Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 08/25/2014 01:37AM by scanman1.

Just to follow through, My cell phone shop was accepted by the MSC.


Now I'm off to a Microsoft Store to decide if they have something in the same price range as a Chromebook for a family member.

I have a question I'm going to ask that I really want to see how the sales rep. handles.

Microsoft very quietly removed the graphics interface for the "Windows Experience Index benchmark tool" that was so proudly touted as a way to determine the quality of the hardware and intoduced with Windows Vista and used to rate hardware up to Windows 7.

It was displayed on the main system information screen, and was a built in hardware rating in the operating system.

Right before Microsoft came out with the Microsoft Surface and Windows 8, they decided they didn't like this tool anymore, as it really showed that the hardware that they were selling didnt score very well with thier own benchmarking tool!

They could not change the tool to falsely improve the score, so removing the tool that they built for consumers to compare the hardware scoring while shopping for hardware was eliminated.

The tool still exists, but the graphical interface for it was removed:

[www.cnet.com]

I'm sure Microsoft has some prepared excuse that the sales person is to say with a straight face for this question.

I will ask, "Where is the Windows Experience Score?", After I pull up the About System screen. And see how they dance around this one.

scanman1 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I'm sure Microsoft has some prepared excuse that
> the sales person is to say with a straight face
> for this question.

I would bet that Microsoft doesn't have any excuse other than, "It's our product and we get to decide what features are added/removed as we wish."

I would also expect the sales person to say that their role is to inform potential customers about product benefits, not get into a pissing match with someone who feels they are owed an explanation for the product team's decisions.

I've actually walked into a store and asked the 802.11 question back when the G technology first came out and everyone was still using the slower speeds. I would have asked if the Gorilla Glass was bulletproof in that configuration. But that's just me.

Or you could ask them if it comes in any other colors.

My favorites: "Can I bring this in the shower with me?"

If you are high tech-y, you are going to agree with scan-man, because it seems "logical" and simple to you.

If you are the average customer, you are NOT going to lead the salesperson, but to follow him. The IDEA is to get him to willingly provide you with information, without you dropping tech-y words, props or suggestive questions.

The average customer, let's use me, for instance. I plead that I don't own an iPhone5s, so I go in "clueless." I WANT him to explain everything to me because THAT is usually what the assignment is all about and what the client expects.

How useful is it to the client if I ask very high tech-y questions to the salesman? I'm not there to educate HIM, he is there to educate ME.

Microsoft themselves created this synthetic "benchmarking" tool and then forced all of the partnering hardware companies to activly use this tool to market thier Microsoft Operating System PC's for many years. They made every other company put this rating on stickers attached to the computers.

This is a consumer rating system Microsoft made to make it easy for consumers to identify what hardware was better than another with five seperate points to compare.

A clueless consumer who shopped for a Windows product prior to Windows 8 would have had this information thust at them by the pc makers. This is why I chose this as the one leading question.

I allowed the salesman to make it through his presentation before I asked him this question. Only after he got to the point that he had fully pitched the device and was at the stage that he wanted me to "play around with it".

I don't know if this was the company line, or him thinking on his feet, but he replied without missing a beat is that this tool was obsolete with Windows 8 due to the fact that Windows 8 runs on more processor types and requires less resources to run Windows 8 Apps and is not a good indicator of the user experience anymore.

I accepted his absolute BS explanation and did not mention it in the report. Everyone I know that runs Windows 8 is using it for Desktop software and the benchmark is 100% still valid and meaningfull.

scanman1 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Microsoft themselves created this synthetic
> "benchmarking" tool and then forced all of the
> partnering hardware companies to activly use this
> tool to market thier Microsoft Operating System
> PC's for many years. They made every other company
> put this rating on stickers attached to the
> computers.
>
> This is a consumer rating system Microsoft made to
> make it easy for consumers to identify what
> hardware was better than another with five
> seperate points to compare.
>
> A clueless consumer who shopped for a Windows
> product prior to Windows 8 would have had this
> information thust at them by the pc makers. This
> is why I chose this as the one leading question.
>
> I allowed the salesman to make it through his
> presentation before I asked him this question.
> Only after he got to the point that he had fully
> pitched the device and was at the stage that he
> wanted me to "play around with it".
>
> I don't know if this was the company line, or him
> thinking on his feet, but he replied without
> missing a beat is that this tool was obsolete with
> Windows 8 due to the fact that Windows 8 runs on
> more processor types and requires less resources
> to run Windows 8 Apps and is not a good indicator
> of the user experience anymore.
>
> I accepted his absolute BS explanation and did not
> mention it in the report. Everyone I know that
> runs Windows 8 is using it for Desktop software
> and the benchmark is 100% still valid and
> meaningfull.

Repeat after me: Play Dumb-er

And think about this: If you ask a salesman a very technical question and he does not know, then he is going to feel embarrassed. ...

It sounds like your truly know a lot more than the average cell phone salesman. Why not blog it or create a video of what you know?

On a simple cell phone shop, you stand out like anal warts on a boars behind

SunnyDays2 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

>
> On a simple cell phone shop, you stand out like
> anal warts on a boars behind


That is an awful, horrible, horrible mental image that I now wish I didn't have.

SunnyDays2 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> If you are high tech-y, you are going to agree
> with scan-man, because it seems "logical" and
> simple to you.
>
> If you are the average customer, you are NOT
> going to lead the salesperson, but to follow him.
> The IDEA is to get him to willingly provide you
> with information, without you dropping tech-y
> words, props or suggestive questions.
>
> The average customer, let's use me, for instance.
> I plead that I don't own an iPhone5s, so I go in
> "clueless." I WANT him to explain everything to me
> because THAT is usually what the assignment is all
> about and what the client expects.
>
> How useful is it to the client if I ask very high
> tech-y questions to the salesman? I'm not there to
> educate HIM, he is there to educate ME.

Well said Sunny!

Maybe these are cell phone shops I haven't seen posted, and I am confused. Why did the OP ask three questions? Was it a requirement under the guidelines to ask three questions? The cell phone shops I have seen say to see what they will tell you and don't say to ask questions, only ask a question if they don't mention a particular phone. Like if you are shopping for LG or Samsung, if these are not mentioned, say "what about LG?" I did see one that said to ask technical questions, but the guidelines told you what questions to ask.

My sister and I purchased a samsung s5 two weeks ago at a t-mobile mall kiosh. I'm barely tech literate and I have to tutor her regularly. My teens and twenty year olds of course know tons. My sister asked about both the gorilla glass, being water proof and the size of the largest card. All info that she got from ads for the phone and talking to sales associates not internet research. She only buys a new phone every 4 or 5 years. The t-mobile guy did not know the answers either. I cannot do cell phone shops for work as hubby works for verizon fios (cable division) so no cell phone, home phone or cable shops here.
I know as a customer I have had sales associates use the internet on the spot to get the answers to a question. So still info I would like to have as a manager or owner.

scanman1 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> I don't feel my shop was blown by me asking 3
> questions. The unmanned kiosk and the fact he took
> off again for a second break while I was there and
> the other observations are all still relivant.

How do you know that he left for a second break? I have seen kiosks in malls where there is another kiosk or an actual storefront where the same employee rotates around either because they are short-handed or that employee is to cover other employee's breaks.


> The company may want to know how the
> salesperson handles 1-2 questions he dont know the
> answer to.
>
> These are things I'd think the company would want
> to know about.

Your job as a shopper is to report the FACTS just like a reporter would. There is no room for your feelings or opinions. That is Basic MSing 101.

@ scanman ~ You need to get outside of your own head. It is fine to be a techie but like others have said, the average customer is not. One of your follow-up posts regarding an upcoming shop states that you have a Microsoft Experience question and you want to "see how they dance around this one."

Your job is not to try to trip up the salesperson and show how superior your knowledge of technology is. If you keep up with this practice, a shop or two will eventually be rejected and you won't get paid for it. Like you said, the owner of the MSC is an active member of this forum so that person will be able to read everything you are doing during these shops.

Jay C Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Maybe these are cell phone shops I haven't seen
> posted, and I am confused. Why did the OP ask
> three questions? Was it a requirement under the
> guidelines to ask three questions? The cell phone
> shops I have seen say to see what they will tell
> you and don't say to ask questions, only ask a
> question if they don't mention a particular phone.
> Like if you are shopping for LG or Samsung, if
> these are not mentioned, say "what about LG?" I
> did see one that said to ask technical questions,
> but the guidelines told you what questions to ask.

I've done those, both video and non-video. If the sales person does not bring up certain features of the phone, I have to ask specific questions. There are different questions depending on the shop. My questions were about the HDR (still don't know what it is), auto focus and water resistance.

Average customer questions to me are what colors does the phone come in, do you have it in Stock and are Facebook and Twitter preloaded apps.

@ cubbiecat ~ HDR = High Dynamic Range. It is basically a photography term. I won't go all foto tech on you. ;-)

Scanman1, I have no idea what your are even asking about. I would stick with being an uneducated shopper.

Whoa. Are you pretending to buy the phone, or pretending to build it? I honestly started feeling stupid just reading your questions. I can't imagine being a new hire and having them reeled off at me.


My favorites to use:

--I do a lot of writing and sometimes I'll use my iPhone for Google Docs (yes, really--I've "texted" entire chapters on my phone). Can I do that with this phone?

--Does this call out of the country?

--I'm hard of hearing. What's the volume/sound quality like on this?



You're "buying" a phone to use. Not to take it apart.

Same!

My favorite question is to let them get all the way through their spiel about all of the amazing and wonderful things it does, then ask "So can I still call people on it?"

ninamason Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
I honestly started feeling
> stupid just reading your questions.

Couple things:

About the MSC owner reading the forums: I'd be surprised if every MSC on the list doesn't have someone reading these forums. That's why my registration here uses a different name and email from my MSC profiles. This way I can talk freely about the companies I work with and not feel like I have to worry about getting booted.

About your technical questions: They want to see if the rep can sell you a phone/service, not how much he knows about it. I put on my "stupid" demeanor when shopping. (I'm a bit worried about how easily I can do that.) Then I wait to see what they offer me. If I come in saying exactly what I want or knowing too much, how can they try to sell me something to which I can offer and objection?

Interestingly, I've done about 20 celphone store shops and NOT ONCE has an associate tried to close the sale. My usual scenario is "my son in turning 16 so we want to get him a smart phone. I have an older "dumb" phone that my company provides me so I don't know anything about contracts and data usage and the like".