I have decided that if a company does not pay a fee or is not a Fine Dining restuarant I am not going to do them in 2011.
Last week, I did a salad place and they really didn't like my narrative so they deducted money from the amount that I had laid out. No more! my time is too valuable and I really do not need another meal.
Even the FF, pay a fee and that is why I still do them.

I do agree....even the nicer restaurants (that used to pay a fee), whose reports are long and involved, just give the meal. I don't need to eat out as much as I do. I'm only doing the restaurants I love, and want to go too...that makes it worth while, but give us a little something for the report. The client provides the meal, it doesn't cost the MSC much, they make out, we get a meal from the client, not the MSC. Maybe a good idea would be at the end of the year to give their good shoppers a gift card for a thank you...I'd be happy with that.

What? Stop taking super easy free oil change shops and haircut shops? To me, these are serious money savers, with oil chages approaching $60! And, a $40 rebate on my hair cuts is well worth it! The report, in each case, takes less than 7 minutes, has no narrative, and the time spent on the shop is time I would have had to spend getting an oil chage or haircut anyway.

A $60 oil change and a haircut would not into fall into the same category that I am talking about. If there is something that I want or need ten I will continue to do them. I guess that I am just trying to eliminate those that only give me a reinburesment for something that I really don't want or need.

We get coupons for oil changes here for $17.99, I just did an oil change and still waiting for $$ (almost 2 months now), charged it, so interest is incurring. I have never gotten a haircut place, but tried....that would be nice. I'm not saying everything is not worth it, some things are, somethings are re-thinkable. Just did a Smart and final, needed a few things, so the $10.00 reimbursement and 7.00 fee works. I was directing my post to restaurants mainly. I had a great lunch at a fun place (L.A. and Vegas only). Owned by the son of the the owner of "Morton's" steak house. Amazing food, resonable and fun, that one stays on my list, even though reimbursement only, and not enough to cover bill. You have to pick and choose what works for you, I at one time, couldn't say no, that was dangerous.

I much prefer shop oil changes even though they take a while to get paid. Whenever I have gone for a cheap oil change and/or a good coupon deal I have wasted several hours waiting for service. A shop one (other than at a dealership) I am in and out in less than 30 minutes and by the time I get paid it is time to 'reinvest' in the next oil change.

While I won't turn down a fee on a restaurant shop, most of them pay only about $5 and reimburse. It really has little effect on my attitude towards the hour or hour and a half write up of the experience. It really is not truly a "payment" for my work. If the dining experience is not worth the risk to the outlay involved, there is no point in doing it because of a $5 fee added!

The oil change I did for working is the same shop that gives out coupons. There regular shop with MSC goes for $35.00. They are never busy at the time I go. I also remember the day when we got paid 20.00 fee for upscale restaurant shops, so, have a bad taste in my mounth seeing how it went from that to zero.

I would bristle if my reimbursement was decreased as G8r posted. I recently had to reshop a car wash because my first was invalid. I had accepted the upsell of tire gloss, which was a no-no. So, I bought the first wash plus four dollars worth of tire gloss and got nada dollars for it. Irked. In the future, the employee can upsell all the live long day, to no avail. Take that, client!

Oil change shops are good, except for the dealerships. They charge out the wazoo. Typically, they may pay a reimbursement amount plus fee of $10 or so to boot. The dealership's price cuts into the fee. Boo. AAA garages used to be shopped. They're competent and so reasonably priced. I miss their shops, but if I need an oil change and tire rotation, on my dime, that's where I go.

Only a small percentage of the restaurants I do pays a fee. That's not a deal breaker for me. My decision is based on who the MSP is and whether or not I want to eat at the restaurant. Eating out on a shop saves me money. If it's also enjoyable, I'm there.

Eating out (of course) improves your lifestyle and is fun, but, saving money...I wouldn't be eating in half of these places if I wasn't reimbursed. My account dwindles putting out so much money...I'm still doing it, but got samrter about it. Being aware is a good thing.

Granted restaurant shops pay little in fees. I am willing to write the report for the dinner. I do still see some with a nice fee but I have learned my lesson on those. The fee is there because either the report is just awful or because the reimbursement does not start to cover the cost of the required purchases. It does me no good to get a $20 fee with a $40 reimbursement when the dinner is $70 minimum cost just to make the required purchases.

But there are ways to make this stuff work. Dinner tonight was put on a credit card that is paying 5% cashback this month for restaurants. So there is $4 of "free money". The company for whom I did the shop will pay before I need to pay the credit card. But even if they don't, that is what the 'shop kitty' is for. Today I received a check that included more than $400 in reimbursements. That money goes right back into the 'shop kitty' and I only get to "keep" that part of the check that is NOT reimbursements. The $400 in expenses covered by that check were paid on a credit card that was actually paid two days ago out of the kitty. Kitty was getting lean, but now she is back to her fat, sassy self.

I changed my shopping account to a high-yield checking account. It pays 3.5% and I have to do 12 debit transactions per month. The debit card is a Visa which has an awards program as well. My kitty had to start fat since I'm not charging anymore. I pay for this month's shops with last month's reimbursements.

I learned about this account on a bank shop. Rewards and 3.5% paid on a balance up to $25,000 . . . Now that would be a fat kitty.

That is certainly a sweet interest rate in this market, Mert! And the point is that with the recognition that reimbursements are money to recycle into future work rather than treat as current income to use for non-shop activity, one is ready to perform future work.

A kitty is somewhat painful to get started because initially the money needs to come out of your pocket for that reimbursement which will subsequently be set aside. And no, I would not normally pay $40 for an oil change but use a coupon and spend two hours waiting for my vehicle to have it done for $20. But even if that $20 I would have paid is all that goes into the kitty, it is a start. Subsequently the existence of the kitty allows me to consider doing that $60 fee job that requires an outlay of around $250 to be reimbursed. When the kitty needs to grow, some fees are sacrificed to it, but when kitty grows fatter than needed, some of the funds can be bled back to the wallet.

Over the course of a year I usually spend between $6000 and $10,000 that will be reimbursed. That happens based on a kitty that runs between $1000 and $1500 (it varies, but I generally try to have the size be roughly the past 2 or 3 months of reimbursements). The money just recycles and recycles and recycles, providing both household needs coverage as well as lifestyle benefits on a tax free basis.

I have to agree with the OP here. I don't use/have credit cards so any oop is just that. Those $35. (or more) meals that I cant afford to start with and have to wait 30 or more days to be reimbursed are going to have to end for me.

If the pay was every two weeks like one of the companies I do I would be doing them till the cows come home.
It just simply takes far to long to turn the money around.

I also have the high yield checking account. It is a great deal if managed right. Mine requires an auto pay or direct deposit, 10 debit card transactions, and a bill pay per month. Right now it is paying 3.9% on balances up to 25K. There are quite a few banks and/or credit unions that are offering this type of product. It usually is a community type bank or credit union (i.e. the big guys like Chase, BofA, US bank, etc. are not offering this product).

I know of two that are doing it in Washington State, and the one I have is out of NC.

Justme615 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I have to agree with the OP here. I don't use/have
> credit cards so any oop is just that. Those $35.
> (or more) meals that I cant afford to start with
> and have to wait 30 or more days to be reimbursed
> are going to have to end for me.
>
> If the pay was every two weeks like one of the
> companies I do I would be doing them till the cows
> come home.
> It just simply takes far to long to turn the money
> around.


I certainly understand. I used to spend money from my household account for shops. My shop purchases generally are from $500-$1000 per month. Taking that much money from my household budget was worrisome, and not without risk. Payback from MSP's could take from 30 to 60 days.

Shops pay for 100% of my family's groceries, pet food, toiletries and cleaning supplies. Frequent dining out, which my husband and I enjoy, but could not otherwise afford are from shops. Oil changes, office supplies, some clothing and gas. . . These shop purchases are valuable to us. I just needed a way to pay for them in advance, so to speak, without risk. So, I opened a shopping account.

Fees and reimbursements from shops were put back into my business. The kitty was fed and grew. She got fat, and to help her lose weight, she just paid for a semester of college for my daughter.

So, the kitty is well fed and earns 3.5%, which is her cream

Mert - you just paid for a semester of college from your MS funds? How long have you been doing this?

Damselfly Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Mert - you just paid for a semester of college
> from your MS funds? How long have you been doing
> this?


I've been shopping about five years. The college semester wasn't all that much. For reasons unclear to her mother, my daughter left the university and did a semester at a community college. Her grades cut the tuition way down.