OMG!!! Did Cori/Steri lose ANOTHER client?

January 16, 2014 03:46AM

I think I live near a more densely populated area because I easily scheduled three a day and four a day and I can add other shops. I'm not by any stretch saying I love this but I'm going to make the best of it. I'll be doing these unless I find something I like better. Three a day or four a day does not require three times or four times the drive time for me. I never look at a shop individually; for me it's always part of a route. I can do a loop and get three or four of them along with as many stations as I can handle in a day. The 12 hour report time is tough after a long day. I'm going to check with the company and see if they'll give me a little more time on the reports if I do XX of their shops in a day. Maybe people won't pick these up at $12.00 and they'll increase the fee, but I think that's pennies down the wishing well. I believe every one of these will be picked up for $12.00. Lots of shoppers never got the opportunity for them to reach $12.00. I saw many, many of them picked up at the base offer in my area. How can people work for that? Same way I can work for $12.00. It's a choice they make.

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.

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January 16, 2014 03:47AM

I received these too. It's really bad. At $12 I'm just not going to bother.

January 16, 2014 03:58AM

MsJudi Wrote:
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> You've got to be kidding...for $12. I only just
> recently took the test to be able to do them, and
> still haven't done one (previous MSC) because I
> was waiting to grab a large fee. At that time, no
> dates were available and next time I checked they
> were all gone. The average was about $30 with some
> $40 and some higher. Geesh, I wouldn't consider
> all that rigamaroll for $12.

Who is paying $30 a shop? Are they gas shops? I have done hundreds of those. Don't mind doing them either. What website do you apply to?

January 16, 2014 03:59AM

I only have 2 of them that are less than a hour away from me. I used them extensively as the base for routes. At $12 there are other things to use as route fillers that pay better on a per hour basis.

There are reasons that a body stays in motion
At the moment only demons come to mind

January 16, 2014 04:01AM

That works if you can get two for $50 but I never got two for $50. So for me, four for $48 is as good as it gets and I can get four for $48. One thing about this mystery shopping deal is that it changes all the time. We do not have what we had in the past and in the future we will not have what we have now. What we can count on is that we can't count on anything.

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.

January 16, 2014 04:07AM

I rarely got 2 for $50 but 3-4 in the 25-35 range in a day was super easy for me to do.

There are reasons that a body stays in motion
At the moment only demons come to mind

January 16, 2014 04:21AM

B, that was a good deal for you and I hate you lost it. I loved the Cori bonuses whenever I had an opportunity and I picked up a lot of really good bonuses on stations and treat shops in the boonies. I hate like everything to lose that, but it's gone. We have to stay flexible and do what it takes if we want to make this work. Video shopping will change your game and bring you some better paying shops. I believe we will continue to see shop fees go down as the business shakes out. It's not like we're doing something that requires a lot of investment or a detailed skill set. Just about anybody can get started in a few days and get up and running. I've been able to pick up a few bundles of shops lately and the pay was not spectacular but I had steady work and I didn't spend ANY time trying to find more work every day. All my time was productive and I think I did better than when I was searching out individual jobs every day even though the individual jobs paid more money per job. I try to adjust to the business as it changes, and it changes all the time.

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.

January 16, 2014 04:52AM

Well, I'm bummed. Those diy shops have been a nice source of income. Is CoRI/Steri/Expert getting out of the MS business? There's now only one job on the board in my area.

As far as the "old-school" MS company, I've yet to do a job for them. They have several gas stations near me, but if those assignments are of the same scope as the ones I've done for Marketforce, I won't touch them for $11. They seem like a nice group of people, but they never want to offer a fee that works out to more than $6/hour in my world.

January 16, 2014 05:02AM

I love it when people state that "My time is worth more than that so I won't do these " and then proceed to argue with you as to why you should not choose to do them either. Jeez.

The fact is that many of us have the same situation as Mary, we NEVER got any of these shops bonused to $50, and even $25 was sometimes the max amount. So we just plain don't have a choice, and as it appears neither does anybody else since they are GONE from that MSC. Time will tell what kind of bonuses happen with the new one.

I kind of like the fact that jobs are a "set" price and that the price is reasonable not ludicrous. $4 for a gas station job with 16-20 pumps ? That is insulting, $17 (including the reimbursement amount) is not.

January 16, 2014 05:22AM

jjamesanywhere Wrote:
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> There's now only one job on
> the board in my area.
>
>

There's only a couple jobs left this month in my area also. I was wondering if it was because it's January, and things aren't rolling good yet.

January 16, 2014 06:12AM

>>Is CoRI/Steri/Expert getting out of the MS business? <<

That was my gut feeling ... should be interesting. BTW - they do have other types of jobs if you search around the site. Some sound kind of interesting.

January 16, 2014 06:16AM

Boutique, I'm not sure if you were addressing me with that or not, but I don't think I tried to argue that other people shouldn't do them at the new rate. Location has a lot to do with it. I shop rural locations, $12 to go to a rural location isn't enough when I can't schedule enough other shops there to make a good day of it. People like MDN, who are in urban locations, are much different. She could probably schedule a DIY and 4 gas stations and 2 FF and a bank all on the same block. I have to drive 45 minutes to get to all of those in 1 town, much less the same block.

It's just like the gas stations. In another thread someone said they did 14 in a day and considered it a good day. For me to do 14 of that chain I would have to spend 6 hours just on the driving part. Good for them that they can get 14 of them 5 minutes apart, I can't do that. So when things like this happen it hurts some people and helps others. Yes, I'm @#$%& an moaning, but it hurts me. Call me selfish.

Speaking of treats shops, did they move too? I haven't seen them. I didn't do a lot but there were 2 or 3 that I could sometimes pick up in the $30 range every couple of months.

There are reasons that a body stays in motion
At the moment only demons come to mind

January 16, 2014 07:05AM

B, I'm the one that did fourteen and I remember the drive was way up there, something like 290 miles. Yes, there are lots of stations in the cities, but the ones in the boonies paid better. That was an excessively difficult day and I won't do it again. I made a mistake with my scheduling and booked some shops on top of a full day. My bad, had to gut it out. I'm 35 miles west of Fort Worth and I'm able to work up and down I 35 and east and west on I 20. This is a super good area but we have a lot of competition for shops. Every area has its drawbacks. I have to drive a lot to get a good day even though I'm in a densely populated area. For example, four of the diy stores that I booked will be four different towns, with whatever I can find added on. Usually my shops and my days are strung out.

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.

January 16, 2014 01:28PM

I made the trip to the city and did 14 shops, all 5 to 10 minutes apart. If there would not have been 14 and only 1 to 3 miles apart I would not have done this. If I would have stayed local, I could have done 1. If I can find a cluster that isn't the proverbial cluster *****, I will accept a lower rate per stop, I just have a minimum per hour goal of $15.00 including reporting. More $$$ is better.
I can't seem to get the schedulers to understand, that I can't do only one at the low fee, I need many stops to drive anywhere. I don't drive for the pleasure of putting miles on my car. They never bonus anything or offer mileage. However they WILL fly someone from the office, from the west coast, to do the orphan shops. Go figure. They could offer $50 per store and still be cheaper off. I will be doing a mini route today of 5 stops, but have a much higher per stop rate (for another company). I love logical routes when I can do them. Not many available around here. Too many shoppers for the available shops, so they go cheap.

January 16, 2014 04:16PM

I agree with bgriffin 100%. There is no chance I would do these
at 12 dollars. I have always used cori shops as extra filler on other
routes, and it was just bonus money since I was already there. Stopping
to do a shop for 12 bucks, isn't worth the extra money. 25, 30, 40+ is.
At least in most of the areas I shop they still have 2 other big clients
so I won't miss out.

In densely populated city areas, these shops typically went for 11-16 so
this would be about the same price for those areas. Also it seems in general
that (EDITED) shoppers generally dont mind doing more work for less money.
Maybe it's the charm of the schedulers on the phone, or a spell they cast
over you, I don't know. Remember, the few dozen+ active people on this forum are
hardly an accurate representation of their database of shoppers.

= + = + = + = + = + = + = + = + = + = + = +
There are no stupid questions, but there are a lot of inquisitive idiots
==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==
When you try to please everybody, you end up pleasing nobody

January 16, 2014 05:09PM

$12 is less than minimum wage when you factor in the amount of time, effort, and expenditures involved. As long as there are fools who will take the shops, the MSCs will continue running to the bank.

January 16, 2014 05:33PM

OK, here's a fool reporting in. That was harsh but I'm a big girl and I'll handle it. The shopping and reporting time is not less than minimum wage for me. That shop doesn't take long at all and the report is not difficult. Am I happy with $12.00? No, not really, I'd like to have $50.00 or better but that's right up there with my dreams of life with Sean Connery. If you can't do that job and report it for better than minimum wage you're not effective. If you don't want to do it because it's not enough money for you, I get that but calling shoppers who pick them up at $12 fools is not necessary. I can book a loop of four and add to them and have a very good day. I hope you're shopping my area and I thank you warmly for leaving all these to me. It may not be the best deal in the world but it beats working for a living. I'm going to put on my dunce cap and go gettum.

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.

January 16, 2014 05:36PM

I dont agree that 12 dollars is less then minimum wage. There is only
one city in the u.s. where minimum wage is now 15 dollars an hour.

You would need to take over 90 minutes to do one (EDITED) shop to drop
below minimum wage, and if it is taking you that long...you are doing
something very wrong.

January 16, 2014 05:41PM

I think part of the problem we're having with a couple of biggies leaving the previous MSC is that a while back that MSC was an easy out for us on any given morning and we could figure on picking up some sweet cupcake shops every month. It's been plain for a long time that they were showing fewer and fewer clients and while I'd love for them to come back with a full board I'm not optimistic. I'm hoping they're not phasing out MS and that this is just a temporary lull for them. It comes to my mind that the move of these two big clients might actually have been a three way deal involving the old company, the new company, and the clients. No matter what's going on, if I want to do this I have to work with what's available. I have to deal with these seismic shifts in the business if I want to do this. Complaining about what fees the companies offer and beating up on each other pays exactly zero, which is well below minimum wage anywhere.

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.

January 16, 2014 07:15PM

MDavisnowell Wrote:
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> beating up on
> each other pays exactly zero, which is well below
> minimum wage anywhere.

Amen!

January 16, 2014 07:52PM

Man, this stinks. Hooray for those this benefits, but it bad for me. I had the best of both worlds with this shop - I could pick up 2-3 in my area that involved very little drive time for $22-$25 easily. There were a couple more that regularly went to $50 that were about an hour or so away, plus I never had any problems finding extra jobs to fill out the trip.

I will not deal with the new company at all. The website is an enormous hassle, I hate the constant phone calls, the pay is low. Not worth it.

January 16, 2014 08:11PM

Tower, I can't improve the website or the pay scale but you can stop the phone calls if you don't provide a phone number. It's not required.l

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.

January 16, 2014 08:19PM

Let's take a look at the two major clients that were lost to another mystery shopping company. Let's say Company A lost out to Company B on a bid basis (which we don't know happened, but let's pretend). How did that happen? Perhaps Company A had a system of listing shops at super low entry level prices and increasing the price up to whatever it took on the outliers figuring they would come up with a lower average than they would if they paid a working wage for the shop from the start. Apparently that didn't work as well as they hoped. Perhaps Company B looked at the bid and said OK, what's the price at which shoppers will pick these up consistently? How about $12.00 plus $1.00 on the DIY? How about $17.00 on the GS? We can offer that and we can bid XX and maybe we can get these huge accounts. We know our shopper base and they'll go for that. Let's give it a shot.

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.

January 16, 2014 08:23PM

Actually if you look back for say ten years for (EDITED) I can see 5 different companies they have used through the years. For those who do not keep the little black book it is a good use.

January 16, 2014 08:56PM

Both the new MSC and the client are mentioned in this thread, so possibly some posters would like to edit their comments.

**********************************
Always take the high road.

January 16, 2014 10:21PM

I am aware that I can remove my phone number from the database, but fortunately I have a smart phone that is smart enough to not let those calls ring through to me (I use a screening app). I'll stay on all their lists in the hopes that they join the modern age at some point, but until that happens, I am having no problems booking jobs that pay better with significantly less hassles.

January 16, 2014 10:32PM

I can book jobs that pay better, too. I just can't book enough of them.

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.

January 17, 2014 01:47AM

I'm discerning another potential downside to the two transplants, at least in my neck of the woods. I think that these two major clients have attracted an appreciable number of new shoppers to their new MSC, and these new shoppers are now also taking shops at the longstanding clients of the new MSC. I've had three instances in the past week of longstanding client locations being pitched to me, with my distance-pay/bonus request being only what I received for those locations last time, and then not getting the assignments. There's never been anyone else but me at some of these sites for two years straight.

January 17, 2014 04:41AM

You may be right Elcare, or it could be a brand new shopper. I remember years ago when I signed up they seemed excited to get another shopper this far west in the state. It's obvious that over time more people have signed up to shop the western area here and that happened a while back. The shopping pool probably shifts around all the time as some shoppers wash out or find permanent work and new ones come into the mix.

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.

January 17, 2014 07:24AM

>>Boutique, I'm not sure if you were addressing me with that or not, but I don't think I tried to argue that other people shouldn't do them at the new rate.<<

No, not you specifically. I was just commenting on the frequency with which some shoppers seem to try to convince others that the jobs are not "worth it" for anyone to do, when obviously that isn't true.

It would be peachy keen if we could all graze on only those high bonused shops and ignore the "regular" priced ones but that ain't happenin' no more. Not here anyway.

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OMG!!! Did Cori/Steri lose ANOTHER client?

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