Don't ask me why it duplicated my post.. it's not my fault

I did not see anyone degrading or mocking shoppers for taking a job at starting price. I did see posts suggesting that new shoppers could be taking shops at base fee without asking for bonuses. I read that several people were in a state of disbelief because jobs are being taken much quicker than in previous quarters/months. I read suggestions for how to maximize profits by purchasing smaller items. I saw a poster suggest that relationships with schedulers allowed shops to be picked up at higher than posted rates. I also read some posts that poked fun at the MSC's offering fees. Perhaps I read posts too literally.
I agree that times are tough, however if the shopper holds out until the shop hits $25, the rate of pay is doubled, and times would be a bit less "tough". I am curious - even if the shops are next door to each other, how would I perform 8 shops in two hours? I am not attempting to be sarcastic - I would be ecstatic if I could achieve the speed you described. I would have to do each shop in approximately 10-12 minutes to achieve your times. Even at 15 minutes each, the time to walk from one station to the next would place my time at over 2 hours. Each survey gives an error message if the time in and time out difference do not equate to 20 minutes. I'm just curious - perhaps I can better myself and be able to maximize profits by not holding out for larger rates in the future.

@ALTEXPERT wrote:

I believe those that mock people taking gas jobs at their starting prices don't need the money. Times are tough. I'll happily take the 12.50 jobs for that 5 dollars of gas. 8 shops gets a hundred dollars in your pocket and 40 dollars of free gas. Jobs are close together where i live, less than 2 miles apart, so i can do them in about two hours. 50 dollars an hour doesn't stink.

Maybe there's a communication issue here. Maybe some folks are not understanding that the current due date on the job posting is not the final date for the current round of shops. The dates that you see on the shops as the due dates Are the dates that you are agreeing to do the jobs at the price that it is posted at currently. If you just leave it a few days you will see that the dates change, the dates will change 2 or 3 times, then the pay will increase, then it will repeat itself every couple of weeks until the end of the cycle. At the end of the cycle they will attach big bonuses and say please help me come take the shops for $60 or $70 or $80 or $200.

There is no shame in taking low priced jobs. But if you can afford to wait a couple weeks, you can easily double your money for the same amount of work. And if you wait until the end of the cycle, whether it's monthly or quarterly, you can do MUCH better for far less work. But, because of newbies that don't understand the system, and folks that think there is virtue in working harder for less money, most of those good paying jobs at the end of the cycle are going to be remote.

It's very possible to do eight nearby stations in five hours, including the drive time. Add two hours for reports, and that's $20 per hour when considering the valuable gas reimbursement. There are some areas where you cannot wait for the bonuses to go up, especially with the way Ipsos raises them at a snail's pace. To wait until it doubles, at the slow pace of Ipsos is not realistic in this areas. Because Ipsos allows you to monitor, by checking the list every quarter, how fast or slow the shops go in your area (and I personally keep a spreadsheet exclusively devoted to try and analyze when the shops get taken), you can see that some areas get taken quicker.

Tomorrow, I am doing an eight gas station, five post office shop (which can be spaced out between the stations), where I will be done within the seven hours. Factoring in the valuable gas which will be fill me up to do other things, that's $200 for seven hours. You can be very productive and profitable by taking stations at base instead of letting another shopper do so. Because like I said above, another shopper will take the area before Ipsos even thinks about bonusing.

Maybe there is no "degrading" or "mocking", but there is a general tone when it comes to these shops to where I agree with Altexpert.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/05/2022 10:56AM by KA047.

I have stated before I rarely if ever do a shop without a bonus. It doesn't make economic sense to me. But, if I lived in a city where there were dozens or hundreds of easier brands that got snatched up the first few days, period after period, I would probably try to lock in at least a couple of days worth of nearby work at base pay.

In a city with small clustered stations you have done over and over, it is easily possible to do eight in 2 hours if nothing goes too wrong and you do reports later. I have never done it, largely because I am wary of the "Why did it take you under 20 minutes to complete the inspection" question. But in any case, that kind of clustering would be short-lived, with stations gradually getting farther apart and other issues increasing the times and decreasing the profits, and storing all that free gasoline would become increasingly unwieldy.