Yet another reason why I do most of my shop photography with a DSLR and a zoom lens.

Okay...you all make very good points. I will accept that I did not do it as they wanted. End of it. Thanks for all the input.

MARKETFORCE is notorious for this behavior for the FF client. It seems that if the report is at all negative, they do not want it. They will drop it and disqualify shoppers for no apparent reason.. Literally. I called to ask about it. After dodging the question through numerous emails, I called them and demanded an answer. I was told that It was nothing that I had done but they periodically change out shoppers. That doesn't even make sense to me. I have never been treated this way by any other company. I was pretty good to them, picking up shops over three hours away because they could not fill them.. (For a hefty bonus, obviously) It's very dissappointing.

That is disappointing Trista. You would think MSC's would want seasoned, experience shoppers.adly it is a common purge in Retail. Move him/her out, bring someone else in - usually cheaper. All the time and money spent on training wasted.

I have had a shop rejected on a technicality, knowing full well that the MSC was dropping the report due to bad conduct that I observed and reported that was beyond the scope of the questions presented. I now report for this same customer and MSC and will not volunteer conduct that is not a direct question. If I have to report negative conduct, I will put in the comments the details of the conduct in the softest way possible and if there is a reason for the no answer that is due to the employee being pulled away to do something else, I will make certain to fully explain the circumstances that caused the negative if there is a reason the employee did not get a yes.

I do not lie though. If there is a no, then I will state that honestly. I do not volunteer any negative information beyond the scope of the questionnaire with this firm.

MF does NOT drop shoppers due to negative reports. That is a complete MYTH and up there with one eyed clopsy.

They drop shoppers for inactivity or not doing enough shops BUT NOT for negative reports ( if they are accurately reported)

More than 50% of the FF shops I reported were NEGATIVE and I was not dropped

I agree@jackaroe. When there is a negative part of the report, and it is serious, I get a call or an email for clarification. And that's that. I am still shopping for MFI.

I really don't understand WHY I was dropped.. I can only assume that it was the contents of my report.. MF was my main company to shop for. I did most of the FF shops in the surrounding 3 counties and would drive long distances at the last minute to fill shops at the deadline. I've never had a shopr returned or disqualified with them..I loved the huge bonuses that they will always negotiate and relied on them for almost half of my shopping income. That's why it is so weird.. The only thing that I can think of is that the shop was pretty negative. This store didn't have it together AT ALL.. It wasn't just one or two things that they were missing on the questionaire.. It was most.. Lucky you that this hasn't happened to you, but I have heard that MF shoppers ALWAYS get the axe at some point.. It just something that they do. I had been with them for at least 4 years.

I have never had a report rejected because I said something negative about the service or food or whatever. However, they only want you to report factual things For EXAMPLE: the meat was over salted and inedible. The potato was not cooked through. They DO NOT want you to tell them I didn't like the green beans because I hate green beans. They do not want you inserting personal likes/dislikes into your report.

My experience with MF has always been a great one until they decided to take the side of the client. The manager was clearly lying and MF chose to accept that. That's okay. Business is business, right? Their client is huge (FF) and I am small. This was the first time I've ever had a report rejected, with anyone. Sorry it was so negative, but it was awful. No details here to tell you. It's between me and MF. I reported the facts and someone did not like it. I'm wondering who is sleeping with whom?

Anyway, I am no longer shopping that client which was my choice. I did the last few I had and then declined them permanently.

My integrity was on the line and it did not make me feel good at all.

I recently had an email from MF saying they wouldn't accept a fast food shop for an extremely flimsy excuse. Their communication about this was very poor -- just an announcement that it was an invalid shop and a very basic explanation. I had had to drive an hour each way to do this shop and I'm very upset about not being paid. I don't know whether I'll do any more shops for them. If I can't count on being paid, I'm reluctant to spend three or four hours on a shop. I have done other shops recently where they've sent out e-mails afterwards pestering me for details, even once 10 days after the shop. As others have mentioned, it seems that things don't go well for you if you say something negative. I feel somewhat better after reading in the forum that it's common that they don't pay -- at least it's not just me. It doesn't resolve my question about whether I should still do any work for them. I think not -- it's just not worth the aggravation and bad feelings.

Market Force isn't that capricious. What was the flimsy excuse? If you follow *all* the instructions (not just most of them) and went to the right place, at the right time, got the pictures you were supposed to get, got the receipt you were supposed to get, and were precise in your timings and observations, either did or didn't have a companion with you ... it would be quite rare for them to reject the shop.

So what excuse did they give you. Do *not* name the location you went to. (Don't say, "I went to the Burgerama and blah blah happened" just say "I did a fast food shop and blah blah happened.)

I've done dozens or hundreds of shops for Market Force, somewhere in there, and had two challenged, I explained, and got paid.

When they "pester" you for details, they are trying to *save the shop so they can pay you.* The client has to approve the report, not Market Force, so if Market Force contacts you they are telling you the client won't approve the report without those details.

@dspeakes wrote:

When they "pester" you for details, they are trying to *save the shop so they can pay you.* The client has to approve the report, not Market Force, so if Market Force contacts you they are telling you the client won't approve the report without those details.

True facts. 100% of the reports I had failed by MF were due to not following the directions exactly. That ff chain is very specific about their reports and requirements and will check drive thru video and in store video to verify everything. If your stuff is off by more than a second or two, expect to have it rejected. If you brought a friend or sibling, you're gonna get rejected. Didn't stay the right amount of time? Well you didn't want that payment very bad did you?

It isn't like other clients where a little bit of leeway is okay. Their management bonus's are highly affected by the mystery shops that are done. They have to be picky because they owe it to their staff to make sure there is NOT question that everything in that report is true. If they find one inconsistency, you will be failed 100% of the time. If you worked there wouldn't you want to know that your bonus isn't in the hands of whether or not the mystery shopper was 100% accurate? I want that bonus to be in MY hands.

(I know this because my girlfriends best friend and former roommate is a manager for that company. He always wanted me to shop his store haha. )

I'm a super experienced shopper, but I wont do those jobs. Too high maintenance and better ways to make money. I had too many rejected shops for that client. Those reports require perfection and it's just not my cup of tea

I do tons of other work for them that I don't have those same issues. Just to clarify for everyone, tons is an idiom and i don't literally mean 2k ish.

On this forum we get exactly 1 side of the story. That's it. It's incredibly rare for any msp to simply do shady @#$%& like not pay someone with no explanation. Hell, ive done thousands of reports and ive never had a report rejected without reason that satisfied me except once. I appealed the decision of the editor and explained why the directions weren't followed (there was legitimately two ways to interpret a section and one was not okay by the client). I won the appeal. Got paid. There was an occasion where a client did not accept my report, but the MSP said I followed the directions and paid me anyway.

I question anyone who claims they were not paid from an MSP for "no reason". Short of them lying to you and pocketing your payment that means the scheduler, editor, and what have you are also not getting paid so short of stealing, there is literally no reason to lie to you about this. They are SUPER motivated to make sure your shop is accepted. Schedulers only make as much as their shoppers do reports correctly and MSP's only make as much as shoppers complete too.

Just a note for everyone, just because an MSP doesn't pay you with an explanation doesn't make it legal. When you accept a contract with a business or individual and they do not want to pay you, they have to demonstrate how you didn't fulfill the contract or they are legally obligated to tell you. They may not give you an explanation but that doesnt' make it legal.

Plus just look around the forums. It's easy to know when it's a crappy MSP. They dont last long and EVERYONE is talking about them. Take the video shopping company who hasn't been paying shoppers as an example of that.

@jrossetti wrote:

Just a note for everyone, just because an MSP doesn't pay you with an explanation doesn't make it legal. When you accept a contract with a business or individual and they do not want to pay you, they have to demonstrate how you didn't fulfill the contract or they are legally obligated to tell you. They may not give you an explanation but that doesnt' make it legal.

Well said. I tried to make this point in another thread but apparently I wasn't getting my point across.

@LJ wrote:

@jrossetti wrote:

Just a note for everyone, just because an MSP doesn't pay you with an explanation doesn't make it legal. When you accept a contract with a business or individual and they do not want to pay you, they have to demonstrate how you didn't fulfill the contract or they are legally obligated to tell you. They may not give you an explanation but that doesnt' make it legal.

Well said. I tried to make this point in another thread but apparently I wasn't getting my point across.

I thought you were clear, personally.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/08/2015 01:22AM by jrossetti.

You found it? I couldn't even remember what thread it was in. It's hell getting old.

No, I read it earlier going through older posts. Something about an msp denying a report or something. Very descriptive. I know



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/08/2015 04:05AM by jrossetti.