Would you do one?

I would. If I was taking the cruise already and a shop was offered that reimbursed all or some of my fare. I could find a way to devote an hour or so a day to the "experience" and write the narrative concerning it.

The gray area is that when you cruise, you usually aren't getting the spa treatment unless you pay for it, the art auction unless you pay for it, the shore excursion--unless you pay for it. These can be hundreds of dollars each!

If a cruise shop required me buying a lot of these add-ons; I'd probably pass on it since I'm putting out a lot of money and it may not get repaid; thats a lot of exposure. But if it's a straight up cruise audit, I'd be willing to do it if I was going anyway.

So that being said...can anyone point me in the direction of an MSC that offers cruise shops? The old lady and I may be doing one in the next 8-12 months.

I'm pretty sure you would be spending FAR more than an hour a day devoted to the shop.....
I've never done one as I only cruise with one company, have never seen a shop for them and always vacation with my husband AND kids so too many people for a shop.

I would be afraid to put that much money up. I would worry sick if they would find something stupid for not paying me. If they put up the money for the cruise, I wouldn't mind paying everything else.

As someone who has done a bunch of cruise shops, I can tell you there are not really worth the amount of work...except for the high-end cruises. You can get a casino comp on most of the major cruise lines without too much investment and not have to do the shop component.

That said, I had to do the spa, specialty restaurants, and all the other upcharge elements for the cruises I shopped.

I would also add that most of the resorts I shop have a much higher price tag than the cruises, for just a few nights. Those are a better deal IMHO.

Coyle has had occasional cruise shops in recent years. I don't know a lot about the cruise industry but my impression is that the line that was being shopped is fairly mid-level, and while parking at the pier was reimbursed, flights to/from the ship were not.

As far as the fear of not getting reimbursed goes, I've done a few very expensive resort shops for Coyle and I never got any sense that they were trying to find ways to deny reimbursement. In fact, often the editing process is smoother and more reasonable than what one encounters doing their parking and mid-level dining shops, although more than anything it's a luck of the draw. That being said, if the fear of non-reimbursement would keep you from enjoying the experience, there wouldn't be much point in doing it.

@SteveSoCal is correct about casino comps on boat. I have an 8 night cruise booked for october for 3 people and it costing me $800 total for all 3 after port fees/taxes. I added extra person, so the cost went up.

You could lose your butt in the casino in the process, but the next cruise will be free or heavily discounted.

I agree that the work on the cruise is probably not worth it. Just think of all the interactions 1 particular grocery store wants and then imagine all the different things they want evaluated on a cruise ship. Probably every bar and covering each shift. I would expect any customer facing position would need to be reported on and that would be extensive. How much fun could you have worrying about getting all the interactions completed?

How do you know how much you can gamble and get the next free/discounted cruise?
I would be interested in just hitting the mark without going over.

For anyone considering doing a cruise shop, I would recommend they do a few overnight casino/hotel resort shops first. From what I have heard from cruise ship shoppes, they are several times more demanding in work, your time spent on interactions, and writing the reports. Cruise ship shoppers have told me that they make a lot of money because, although the pay was not great, they did not have to spend any money while on the ship, such as for food, lodging, entertainment, etc. Most of their time was spent on interactions and reports. I think it might be a good gig for a solo homeless mystery shopper with no home expenses or obligations.

@BarefootBliss Royal Caribbean has the most transparent system of al the cruise lines as far as gaming comps. The key is getting into the system.

They have a QR code you scan in the casino and it tells you exactly how many points you need for the cruise you want. It's $5 spent for a point.

If you do not hit the required spend in their casino, you will still get promos and such for free/discounted cruises.

My wife got lucky on our first cruise and hit the required point level while only losing $100. The coin in required is more like $1,500-$2,000 (It depends on the cruise you are on), but if you are winning on the first $100 and keep putting that back in, you can qualify pretty easily...

We each won a free cruise on our next trip, then took my wife's sisters with us on another cruise by booking adjoining cabins.

That said, this also relates a bit to the casino shops thread, because my qualifying spend shop I did for a casino a few years ago put me on the rewards level required to get me the free offer a cruise from a land-based casino, which started this whole thing, and it snowballed.

FWIW; I did OK in the casino on the cruise with my sister-in-laws. Enough to throw them some gaming $$ and still come out ahead. I think I am in less than $500 for the four of us, including tips, for that cruise. We dropped the sisters off and went on a 3 night resort shop from there. It was much nicer than the cruise, but I still have a full day of work ahead of me to get this shop submitted. It's a mixed bag. I am also eating and drinking way too much. And sunburnt (my bad on that one).

I might swear of the resort shops for 2026 and stick to 'free' cruises. I at least have time to visit the gym on the ships. I ran into the fitness center during breakfast on the resort shop and snapped a few pics while the chef was making me an omelet. That's not the fitness routine I need for 2026.

Thanks Steve, appreciated..... when you say "coin in required" - ok, I will sound ignorant here - you are referring to more than slots - table games as well? they must scan your card when you place bets?

I belong to a rewards club for a casino and I find the earnings and redemptions to be a little vague...so I am trying to nail those down....
Actually, I am trying to put together 3-4 months living on cruise ships if I can....I understand there are lots of ways...

@BarefootBliss wrote:

I belong to a rewards club for a casino and I find the earnings and redemptions to be a little vague...so I am trying to nail those down....

Might be getting OT a bit, but my whole input to this thread is saying NOT to shop the cruises, so here's my take on 'free' cruising:

"Coin in" refers to amounts bet, but it's more easily measured with slots. Truth-be-told, the casino doesn't make as much on the tables, and the slots can be adjusted for lower payout tables, so they would much prefer you play the slots, and will give you a better rating/point structure for dong so.

The dealers will take your card when you 'buy in' at a table, and you will get a certain amount of point credits for the bet size x the time you were at the table, but that credit is nebulous. It's not going to be something you can count on, and it will generally be low. I spent 45 minutes at a craps table with a $55 average bet and got about 250 points. You could easily lose thousands with that bet size in that time period, so it's more measured to just stick with slots and reach your goal.

I mainly do that with poker machines. Even with a poor payout, it's probably around a 92% return, so $100 gambled will easily get you $400-500 of coin in on a bad day. That's a specific 100 points you can track as you play, and free cruises start around 1,200 points, so I would guess $1,200 is the most you have to lose to get started, and the value of the comp will be about that much. My first free cruise was a $1,265 value, but it only cost me $100 in 'coin-in' because my wife was having a good day at the slots.

It snowballs from there, however. I get weekly offers for free cruises now, and have booked a number of them. Another forum member, whom most of you can probably guess, went down this rabbit hole with me and found out you can send those offers to other cruise companies, and they will match them! You make the cruise companies fight for your business and then you can pretty much live on a ship if you want.

My current comps value for free cruises in a 12 month period is $22,508 and I am averaging one cruise per month. I was averaging a little over $50k in mystery shop comps last year, and have now split that with cruises, so this year will probably be $20-25k in mystery shops. I haven't don't that math on final totals yet since I have been busy with other projects.

@ArkLaMissshopping wrote:

I would be afraid to put that much money up. I would worry sick if they would find something stupid for not paying me. If they put up the money for the cruise, I wouldn't mind paying everything else.

Yeah, if I was going anyway...I’d be okay with doing a straight cruise that didn’t make me buy the add-ons. If I get reimbursed, great. If not, I had already allocated the moey anyway.

@NinS wrote:

Coyle has had occasional cruise shops in recent years. I don't know a lot about the cruise industry but my impression is that the line that was being shopped is fairly mid-level, and while parking at the pier was reimbursed, flights to/from the ship were not.

As far as the fear of not getting reimbursed goes, I've done a few very expensive resort shops for Coyle and I never got any sense that they were trying to find ways to deny reimbursement. In fact, often the editing process is smoother and more reasonable than what one encounters doing their parking and mid-level dining shops, although more than anything it's a luck of the draw. That being said, if the fear of non-reimbursement would keep you from enjoying the experience, there wouldn't be much point in doing it.

Well, I screwed up a Sonic shop this weekend. I had talked them up to $50 on the shop so it is worth it for me to go back and do it again and get paid. You don’t get that opportunity on a cruise .

I find Coyle gives you plenty of examples of expectations and the testing is honest. The shops I’ve done I’ve received a score of 10 on all except 2 which they were 9. I simply followed their guidelines.

FWIW, none of the Coyle cruise shops I did ever required me to buy a ticket. The room was comped to me and I paid for the travel + extras...but I know the current mid-level clients makes you buy the cruise.

The extras were a spa visit, some up-charge restaurants and visiting every bar on the ship. Most of those (outside of the spa) are things I would do anyways. And you do get a chance to go back if needed. You mess up the pool bar on day #2, you can just go try again on day #3. There were built in days off on the cruise, so plenty of opportunity to correct a mistake. There's nothing about the check in process you could botch to the point of getting denied reimbursement.

The bad part is that they gave me the absolute worst room on the ship. Every single time. They don't care of the mystery shopper has a window or is in the far back of the ship on the lowest level. I would never shop a cruise again that wasn't one of the all-suite luxury lines (they do have those occasionally).

I had to front the money for a cruise and the add ons last winter for Coyle. It was a significant expenditure of both time and money, but we ended up with an experience that we would not have had otherwise.

Besides coyle, any other companies offer cruise type shops? I’ve only ever seen on coyle

@Msilk wrote:

I had to front the money for a cruise and the add ons last winter for Coyle. It was a significant expenditure of both time and money, but we ended up with an experience that we would not have had otherwise.

Would you have taken the cruise anyway? See, I would only do a cruise mystery shop if I was booking a cruise anyway. To put it another way, I’m in Texas so I sail out of Galeston primarily. I’m looking at an 8 night cruise on Symphony of the Seas going to the Bahamas. I may reserve it this Spring. If Company X subsequently offers a mystery shop for my cruise...I’d be willing to look at doing it since I’m already booked. IF they wanted me to switch to Carnival or MSC...nope. Not because I wouldn’t cruise on them...it’s because I’ve researched this particular ship, itinerary, I will have requested the time off for the sailing from my “real job”.

@metro25782

I know it's nice to make money and or have costs offset....but this is a vacation you wanted. Why ruin it with trying to do heavy interaction and narrative intense shop?

My vacations from mystery shopping happen on cruises. I am not willing to pay for the internet and that is my time to unplug. anytime on land, i can reconnect. i never get a break unless i'm on a cruise. even being in some remote region of middle america (montana/dakotas) you can always have service and be occupied with notifications about shops. On the cruise, the phone goes dark.

@hbbigdaddy wrote:

@metro25782

I know it's nice to make money and or have costs offset....but this is a vacation you wanted. Why ruin it with trying to do heavy interaction and narrative intense shop?

My vacations from mystery shopping happen on cruises. I am not willing to pay for the internet and that is my time to unplug. anytime on land, i can reconnect. i never get a break unless i'm on a cruise. even being in some remote region of middle america (montana/dakotas) you can always have service and be occupied with notifications about shops. On the cruise, the phone goes dark.

My thoughts exactly. We typically drive all day to get to a port and stay overnight somewhere. If I can offset a hotel stay, gas, or some meals and I feel confident they won't ask questions while I'm away?Sure! I'll do things during my travels. But I mostly disappear while on vacation. That's my me time. I will say that I made an exception for alcohol compliance while staying with relatives. For obvious reasons, this particular shop type enhanced the revelry.

I have never done a cruise for Coyle.

I have done 6-8 cruises for a very large MSC. I did them pre-2008 recession. I had a travel agent book and pay for the cabins. I had 5 cruise lines to choose from. I could choose any US departure port. I had to take one other adult. I was able to take my kids as long as I paid for them. Sometimes kids go free.

I only evaluated the casino. They did not have any spending limits as I recall. I did all of the notes by hand, as WiFi back then on a ship was crazy expensive and rarely worked. I had no other interactions to report. They gave me a printout of the entire casino staff, including their cabin number. So, I could also see who was paired up with who off the clock. It was super helpful, as most of the names were not common for me (Serbian mostly).

It was a sweet gig while it lasted (2 years). I think that one other person on here was in the group of trusted shoppers. The rest of the shops were done by employees of the MSC.