I had another ATT shop. I was told about their services. When I asked about a phone's features, I was told it's all on the display card, You can read it yourself. I asked for a demo of the features, I was told, "You can handle the phone yourself and try them. That's what they are there for" Once again ATT was only interested in selling services, not phones.

Similar thing happened to me recently at one. The person was way more interested in signing me up for service than selling me a phone.

I have had the same experiences. When I do the shops at Best buy or other places, they go well. But when I go to at&t, the whole thing falls apart when I tell them that I don't want them to look up my account or I just want to look at a phone and not sign up for service at that time. They don't seem interested.

I did a Verizon shop yesterday, and the first thing the rep did was tell me about the service promotion, although the first thing I asked about was a phone. Then he kept trying to steer me to a non-assigned brand & model, and I kept trying to turn the discussion back to the assigned model. The shop took way longer than it should have!

I agree that when you do them at Best Buy, they go well. Last one I did there was fantastic. Salesperson only talked about service promotions in combination with the phone I was asking about. He knew his stuff pretty well, too. I was tempted to buy the phone and switch providers! And I was in and out in less than 20 minutes on a bonused shop, whereas yesterday I was in there for nearly an hour on a base-fee shop. (Only took that because I had another shop in the same area, which was out of town, and figured that the cell-phone shop would pay for my gas. Not so much after spending so long in the store.)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/14/2021 07:13PM by BirdyC.

I've been thinking about doing some cell phone shops again, but most of the scenarios say "apple owner" and I'm not a good enough actress to convince anyone that I've ever used or want to use an iPhone or any apple device. So I've mostly laid off of those. I've seen a few "android other" upgrade shops, but I haven't pulled the trigger, maybe this week since decent paying work is getting more and more difficult to find around here.

I have had a similar experience at AT&T stores though, they will show you the phone you're asking to look at, but they won't tell you anything about it or demonstrate it no matter how many ways you ask. And if I keep asking about the phones without talking about plans they walk away from me. I've had them walk away while I'm asking questions, they don't care about selling phones, they KNOW you're going to get one with your new service. And only shoppers talk about the phones and not the service plans.

Hmmm.......I'm still seeing shops described as "Electronics Mystery Shopping" that pay $16 each. I see "T-Mobile" or "Verizon", but no "AT&T".
Am I seeing different shops than what you have described?
Oddly, in the shop's comments, they say this:

"This is a smartphone recommendation shop. View guidelines for more specifics on assigned scenario."

If so, how does one "view guidelines" without accepting the assignment?

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/15/2021 01:55PM by French Farmer.

I've done many of those shops. Very easy to do.

@French Farmer wrote:

Am I seeing different shops than what you have described?
Oddly, in the shop's comments, they say this:

"This is a smartphone recommendation shop. View guidelines for more specifics on assigned scenario."

If so, how does one "view guidelines" without accepting the assignment?

The ones I'm talking about say what the basic scenario is on the application page. In my area there are a LOT of "Apple owner - switching" or Apple Owner - Upgrade" There are more than 2 MSC's doing cell phone shops and one of those MSC's has several different versions of cell phone shops that pay differently, and probably some MSC's that I no longer get emails from also.

Yesterday they were offering $80 for one of these cell phone shops that normally pays $16. I would have taken it, but it was pouring rain and it's 15 miles on the freeway, in a section that backs up for hours both ways. I had to pass on it.

@johnb974 wrote:

Yesterday they were offering $80 for one of these cell phone shops that normally pays $16. I would have taken it, but it was pouring rain and it's 15 miles on the freeway, in a section that backs up for hours both ways. I had to pass on it.

I sure don't miss traffic. But having anything to do less than 15 miles from my house would be like a dream come true. But then again, I chose this life far away from people.. lol

I did several of them for 60, 70, and $80. I love it when a mystery shopping company finally has to pay.

LOL, I visited the cell phone store that FINALLY opened (I wrote about it several months ago). When I started asking questions, the guy basically cut me off: No one here knows about this stuff. We just opened, and we haven't learned yet.

No stock in yet, so no demonstrations possible. Two VERY bare desks with something that looked very like an Alexa thing-a-ma-jig on each desk. But they could have been air filters, for all I know.
And business cards, which I grabbed.

There is always a big gap between what the MS clients and MSCs require/expect from the actual reality.

The reality is when the MS results are not an integral part of the HR decision, companies would simply use the actual results, i.e. sales number to make personnel decisions.

Also - many shops are created to make mystery shoppers to stand out from typical consumers.

Who can they blame anyway?

I work in Telecom, commission is no longer paid on the purchase of equipment so the reps don't care what phone you select. Apple is the hot thing so they push that since it seems like everybody wants that and well if you want something else as long as I have it in stock it will work. They get paid on the activation and the plan and any accessories you buy though.

I won't do the purchase shops after being burned by an Authorized Retailer. I've done the purchase shop several times with minor incidents (always watch your account even at a corporate stores as the device may still be on the account and charging for service after the return is processed), but this one took the cake. I was told I had to purchase the phone via installment plan, which I did, then I proceeded to pay it off (I normally buy the device outright). What do I know, I'm just a customer.

When I went to return it, he refused saying it was my fault that I paid it off and now I own it. To add insult to the injury, I later figured out, he added insurance to the device without my consent.

It took me almost 6 hours of trying to find the right person at the carrier to help me with this rogue salesperson. The MSC said they would contact their person at the carrier. I felt as I was on my own, I kept going because I bore the risk of being out $500.

After 6 hours of being bounced around the carrier's customer service, I landed in the retention & loyalty department (remember that name - they are awesome people). The supervisor understood my problem immediately and went to bat for me. The problem was so convoluted I was on the phone with her almost 2 hours while she worked through the system to get everything reversed.