Anything you dread happening when on a shop?

September 07, 2025 08:12PM

For me, I dread being in a restroom, right in the middle of taking a photo - and someone opens the door and spots me. Thankfully, it's never happened, but I fear it might someday.
What could you say in that situation?
Other than a shopper, the only people I can think of who take photos in restrooms are potential sexual offenders....you read about them in the news all the time....although usually involving a camera and a stall.
I mean a person in a restroom taking a photo screams weirdo. I can see store management questioning the person as to what they were doing.
My family members know I do shops.....but if anything were to ever happen to me and they go through my phone pics...well lol. I do try to keep up with deleting them lol.

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September 07, 2025 09:10PM

If law enforcement wants to know why I'm taking pictures I'd be more than happy to offer them a copy of the LOA and let them look at my camera file in my tablet. I really don't care what folks think of me.

September 07, 2025 09:55PM

@BarefootBliss wrote:

For me, I dread being in a restroom, right in the middle of taking a photo - and someone opens the door and spots me. Thankfully, it's never happened, but I fear it might someday.
What could you say in that situation?
Other than a shopper, the only people I can think of who take photos in restrooms are potential sexual offenders....you read about them in the news all the time....although usually involving a camera and a stall.
I mean a person in a restroom taking a photo screams weirdo. I can see store management questioning the person as to what they were doing.
My family members know I do shops.....but if anything were to ever happen to me and they go through my phone pics...well lol. I do try to keep up with deleting them lol.

Not long ago I went into the restroom at a convenience store and was snapping the pic when someone opened the door and slammed it into me. It turned out to be an employee, and rather than apologize she just remarked, "I didn't expect someone to be standing in front of the door." Well, she wasn't wrong!

September 08, 2025 12:18AM

I hate it when a customer interrupts and tries to answer the question I ask my target or tries to pay for my purchase, buy me a drink, etc.

September 08, 2025 12:51AM

yeah AZ, those are a buzzkill too....

September 08, 2025 01:32AM

I hate running into someone that I know. I live in a fairly decent sized city, so it's rare. Recently, I encountered my cousins sons girlfriend was working at a retail store as fitting room attendant and I was on a shop. I reported the interaction fairly and honestly. I have also ran into people that I know while on some fast food shops downtown and they act surprised to see me at that location or end of town.

September 08, 2025 02:01AM

That is something I do think about sometimes. My current prepared answer for an employee is that I am remodeling my own restroom at home, and I am looking for ideas. Yeah, I know, silly, but it would just be to delay them until I revealed. But really it is not that big a deal if you only take photos when the restroom is empty. If a customer walks in, I simply say hi, I'm doing an inspection. No issues. If it is an employee, they usually don't care or already know what you are doing. Although there was that one time. I told him I had a new jacket and wanted a picture (it was the selfie.) He had already figured out I was probably the mystery shopper, and was just messing with me.

September 08, 2025 02:31AM

I was doing a dinner shop and the server just set down our plates and said they were going to wait and watch us cut into the steaks to see if they were cooked right. You know I had to take the photographs first, so this just rolled off my tongue: "Can you please come back in one minute, because we have to say our prayer, first." That is something I really do, so I did not care what they thought, but was thankful it had come to mind just in time.

September 08, 2025 03:10AM

@purpleicee wrote:

I was doing a dinner shop and the server just set down our plates and said they were going to wait and watch us cut into the steaks to see if they were cooked right. You know I had to take the photographs first, so this just rolled off my tongue: "Can you please come back in one minute, because we have to say our prayer, first." That is something I really do, so I did not care what they thought, but was thankful it had come to mind just in time.

Cut partially into the steak, separate it enough to check how it was cooked, and then put it back together and take your pic. It should still look OK. If they somehow see where you cut it, just explain what happened and that you didn't want to blow your cover by sneaking in the pic first.

September 08, 2025 03:59AM

Taking photos in the restroom? I was writing down notes once and an employee walked in. Or an employee who is SO nice but after reading guidelines I find out they are not mentioning specials of the month or doing something that in real life wouldn't bother me but on a shop has to be reported negatively.

September 08, 2025 08:08AM

People post selfies of themselves in public washrooms so often.
"Just posting my new top"

When a flower doesn’t bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower.
Alexander Den Heijer

September 08, 2025 08:59AM

I don't know if this applies to the men's room but I can tell you that a LOT of women talk on the phone in the restroom. Apparently they can't wait for a more appropriate location. Who, on the other end of the line, wants to hear all that peeing, pooping and flushing? So rude! And I don't appreciate my own audible activities there being transmitted to others. Just a peeve. But it helps that they're so engrossed in their phones that I can usually get a pic of the restroom while their stall door is closed and they never know.

September 08, 2025 11:50AM

yes, they do post restroom selfies, so there's that.
Of course, when I take MSing restroom photos, my back is to the wall and I am holding out my phone trying to capture the entire room scene to prove its condition.
I've had editors give me a hard time if I only capture a photo of the sink or the floor, etc.
In any event, just something on my mind - just me perhaps LOL...

September 08, 2025 02:57PM

Luckily, the gas stations I do say take a photo only if the washroom is empty and, most of the stations I do have one person washrooms.

When a flower doesn’t bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower.
Alexander Den Heijer

September 08, 2025 02:59PM

yes, that situation would be very different IMO

September 08, 2025 03:26PM

I hate it when I'm threatened with a gun and accused of taking pictures of someone's license plate. I hate it when that happens.

September 08, 2025 05:18PM

I had one a couple of weeks ago where the bartender asked us about dessert before we were even half way done with eating our dinner. My P2 laughed but I hadn't shared the questionnaire specifics with her so it was genuine. The bartender explained the entire mystery shopping program and said that she had to ask the question. Fortunately P2 is a trusting-looking older woman who was like "that's crazy."

The funny thing was that every other employee in the store could not have been less interested about doing their jobs. We didn't like the food, so we won't be back except I have to use up the $60 gift card the next time I visit a friend of mine in Maryland.

September 08, 2025 06:19PM

Many times it is the employees hiding in the restroom to talk on their phones while they are supposed to be working.[
quote=sestrahelena]
I don't know if this applies to the men's room but I can tell you that a LOT of women talk on the phone in the restroom. Apparently they can't wait for a more appropriate location. Who, on the other end of the line, wants to hear all that peeing, pooping and flushing? So rude! And I don't appreciate my own audible activities there being transmitted to others. Just a peeve. But it helps that they're so engrossed in their phones that I can usually get a pic of the restroom while their stall door is closed and they never know.[/quote]

September 08, 2025 10:51PM

I'm with Ses, I don't understand wanting to talk on the phone in the restroom. And I really feel uncomfortable flushing the toilet when someone else is in the room talking. I'm guilty of taking folks to the restroom with me on the phone, but I mute the phone before I flush and I leave the room before I unmute it, but that's mostly when I'm on a very long phone call.

September 10, 2025 04:53AM

@Morledzep wrote:

I'm with Ses, I don't understand wanting to talk on the phone in the restroom. And I really feel uncomfortable flushing the toilet when someone else is in the room talking. I'm guilty of taking folks to the restroom with me on the phone, but I mute the phone before I flush and I leave the room before I unmute it, but that's mostly when I'm on a very long phone call.

I thought that's what a mute button was for"¦

September 10, 2025 04:57AM

My worst fear is doing one of those assignments where you have to take 5 thousand pictures of everything, getting caught, and even with a LOA getting escorted out. It's not just the shame, it's knowing that I'll only get paid a few pennies for each pic or having the report rejected after all that drama!

So, I don't even consider applying for those.

September 11, 2025 04:38PM

I only dread having something outside my control interfere enough that I may not get paid for the task. Or, worse, I invite a guest, explain enough to them that they won't eff it up, and they still ask me questions during the activity that puts me at risk of being identified.

September 11, 2025 06:21PM

Doing something not allowed in the guidelines or forgetting a receipt. Worse, doing a shop on the wrong day.

September 12, 2025 11:24AM

ugh yeah, lost receipts....has happened to me a time or two and I curse myself out lol..
I now have a method, a banker's pouch on the seat of my car. Seems to help.

September 16, 2025 04:24AM

I got threatened with the police many years ago on the mall pizza shop when I took.a photo of the case "so my daughter could tell me what looks good to bring back". They were about to call security. Prob 10.years ago and I have never done that shop.again. the pizza was not great anyway. The rule still.requires that photo.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/16/2025 04:24AM by sandyf.

September 16, 2025 04:58AM

I do not drink much alcohol. Every now and then I do a shop that requires me to purchase it though. What I hate is that when I have only drank like a 1/4 or a 1/3 of the drink...the bartender wants to comp it for me. It doesn't always end up on the receipt when they do.

September 16, 2025 06:16AM

The last time I did a TXRH dinner at the bar shop, a very nice man who was talking to me about football offered to buy my dinner for me. I wouldn't have accepted if I was not on a shop also, but the first thing I thought about was, 'Oh dear, I need the receipt.." LOL

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