Is there a new format? I have done so many shops with this company and know they can be long, repetitive, and tedious. I recently took a bit of hiatus (4 months). However, I just completed a high profile restaurant shop and noticed the questionnaire is significantly shorter. Is this new or this particular restaurant?

Usually 4-5 sections with ~3-5 sentence narratives and multiple choice questions. I do take-out, delivery, carry out assignments with ACL.

I typically do fine dining so I was surprised to see 4-5 section questionnaire rather than typical 8-10.

The ones I do are pretty much unchanged for the past 8 years. Recently they added a handful of new questions about specific timings. I typically don't do their fine dining because I find their clients pretentious and the food not so 'fine'.

My understanding is that they have shortened them. I'm still fairly new to them myself, but from what I've learned, most of their forms are shorter than they use to be, not that they are are "short" or anything, just shorter than before. :}

They may have shortened the report, but the editors are still picky as ever. I did one two weeks ago and the editor nitpicked that I didn't write 8-10 sentences about the non-existent manager. I wrote 6 sentences. I mean, how many sentences can you write about a person that was not there? I thought that was pretty nitpicky. They ask for 2-3 sentences on the cleanliness of a restaurant- interior and exterior- but then require 8-10 sentences on one employee?

Dare,
The "they" is really the client, not ACL! They do have clients that want different, and much simpler, surveys and answer lengths. Same is true of most MSCs and the survey guidelines.

Dare, I usually find that there are multiple possible topics in a section, so asked about the manager there is also something extra, such as crew teamwork. Rarely do I find that there is no manager present, so if the manager is not wearing the appropriate apparel I will comment about someone who seems to be performing managerial duties as well as where I watched for the manager. I can then fill as needed with teamwork or lack thereof by the crew. When the going gets tough there are no compound sentences.

"no compound sentences." I really had to learn that early in my MS career in order to pass muster with a whole lot of editors, not just ACL!

The manager section did not ask about the crew members. That was in a different section. Nonetheless, I've done over a hundred shops for ACL, and this was by far the pickiest editor. I've done shops for this particular restaurant, and ACL was never this picky.

@walesmaven wrote:

Dare,
The "they" is really the client, not ACL! They do have clients that want different, and much simpler, surveys and answer lengths. Same is true of most MSCs and the survey guidelines.

Every ACL assignment I've done is pretty much set up the same. 2-3 sentences about the pre-visit phone call, 5-7 sentences about food, 2-3 sentences about room temperature/music volume. I don't think it's the actual client who is demanding 8-10 sentences about an employee.

I have noticed one client that had some repetitive yet slightly reworded questions that have been merged. I have finished writing everything in one section and saw I was three sentences light with my compound sentences.

I have been under the sentence count and used long and very descriptive sentences and not been penalized for it. There are times in the same report that I went double the required sentence count where there was a trouble area. The sentence count is not set in stone. Its a guideline. If the editor sees value in your report and your heavy in one narrative box that needs attention and a bit lighter in another, I have never had any negative feedback for that.

The first sentence of feedback from my last report was not the canned cut and paste feedback paragraph.

@ wrote:

It was a pleasure editing your report.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2015 06:53PM by scanman1.

btw, I am often under sentence count, but was not penalized. Probably because I exhausted the topic in fewer sentences!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2015 07:18PM by walesmaven.

@walesmaven wrote:

btw, I am often under sentence count, but was not penalized. Probably because I exhausted the topic in fewer sentences!

Chances are good that your editor busted one sentence into two for you so you had enough.

Dare, I suspect you are breaking in a new editor. Part of their editor training is to be too picky. Things should calm down. I don't ever take it personally when I see a new editor name. Now when they indicate I ordered the wrong thing, I suggest that they reread the guidelines or consult with their supervisor. I realize that the editor will not be allowed to answer the email and that it will be automatically 'kicked upstairs' to their supervisor so my responses are always tediously polite.

It never hurts to say, "Thank you for your continued help and support." The higher ups will take care of "the problem."

I truly think I had a new editor. I did not recognize her name, and she commented on my photos not being taken directly overhead the food item. The instructions clearly state to take the photo at a slight angle, and my photos were just like the example photos provided. Ah well, I'm getting paid and that's all I care about at this point.

I am quite willing to email the scheduler when I think that the editor is inventing guidelines! Nearly 100% of the time, the scheduler replies in a very positive fashion. (And, yes, it is mostly to say that the editor in question is new, or new to that project, or was operating under the old guidelines instead of the new ones, and thanking me for catching it.)

Hi Y'all!

What's the pay scale for this?

Thx!

Generally speaking these are reimbursement only shops.

I keep starting the sign-up process for ACL, but usually end up forgetting to finish it before the 48-hour window is closed! I always "mean" to find a sample narrative to give them, and don't get around to doing it in time.... I really wanted to sign up with them for one specific shop that another MSC used to have, but it sounds as if that might be the only one I'd want to take.... I guess I'll finish signing up (will have my narrative ready before starting the application!) and see what happens. Sounds like there's a lot of hassle for reimbursement only.

Birdy,
Many MSCs want a sample narrative so it's a good idea to have one saved. As a newbie to ACL you wi;; see only a small portion of their shops. As you provide good results, what you see will expand.

I actually like the ACL hotel shops. while there is a good bit to do, I find the reporting to be relatively straightforward and I don't mind the reimbursement only as it covers a room for a night on a route.

@walesmaven wrote:

Birdy,
Many MSCs want a sample narrative so it's a good idea to have one saved. As a newbie to ACL you wi;; see only a small portion of their shops. As you provide good results, what you see will expand.

I do have one saved, but I like to change it up depending on what sort of shops the MSC seems to have. But it's probably a good idea for me to just go ahead and take my saved narrative, revise it for two or three different scenarios, and then I should have something suitable on hand no matter what! Even if I have to change a few words, or rearrange a couple of sentences, it'll be faster than trying to re-write one every time I do an application!

And thanks for the tip on ACL--that's good information to have. Probably a good idea to take a few shops I'm not keen on, in order to be offered better ones down the road....

I do a ton of their reimbursement only hotel shops and earn enough hotel rewards points to take a couple of great vacations or subsidize money-making road trips every year. Joining the hotel rewards programs AND getting the affiliated credit card is essential to making this work to best advantage. Their hotel reports are not very demanding IMHO.

I have nothing but good things to say about ACL schedulers and editors.

I do 4 or more shops a month for them and very rarely hear from an editor.

I've found that if I read and follow the instructions I never have a problem.

If ACL or ACL's client want 8 -10 sentences, give them 8 or 10 sentences.

Mystery shopping is narrative driven and if writing narrative does not come easy to you, perhaps you should find another way to make some extra income.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/31/2015 04:50AM by dsvn711.

@dsvn711 wrote:

Mystery shopping is narrative driven and if writing narrative does not come easy to you, perhaps you should find another line of work to make some spare income

When I am done tomorrow I will have done 231 shops this month. I wrote no narrative for all of them except 1 Chipotle, 1 other food shop, 1 convenience store that was about 6 sentences, and 3 retail shops that required me to basically restate the yes/no questions.

I'm not sure what you are talking about?

Lucky you, not sure who you do shops for as all my restaurant shops except a few fast food places are narrative heavy. I did the shop from hell that was a Coyles shop. That shop required 128 fill in the blank questions and each fill in the blank question had a narrative that went with it, so 128 narrative questions had to be answered, and the time frame for the shop deadline fell over a holiday weekend so nobody could be reached when their website went haywire refusing to accept the save and submit, causing me to submit the whole damned thing completely 11 times before it finally worked. In the meantime even though I had sent multiple messages to the company informing them that the website was having problems, they kept sending me little notices informing me the job was time sensitive, as in why the hell haven't you submitted it, when I had been trying over and over and over again to submit it. I really don't think any job has ever frustrated me to that extent. I figured out between the 2 hour round trip drive, the 2 hour meal and the 11 hours it took me to fill in the blank form with narratives I spent 15 hours on a shop whose reimbursement was only $30.00 over the cost of the meal which admittedly is normally a generous reimbursement considering many companies don't even give you more than the cost of the meal. But not when you have those kinds of problems and it takes that long to do it. An experience like that can leave a bad taste in your mouth. I did have an editor for the shop that I had so much grief over who was pretty sympathetic, and she said the same thing had happened to her with their website, so at least I knew it was their tech problem and not mine. The funny thing is before I was even paid for that shop which was approx 7 weeks later, they were contacting me to do it again. I told her I had so many problems with that particular restaurant shop that I wasn't sure I ever wanted to shop for them again and I couldn't believe they wanted me to shop the same shop that had given me so much grief before I had even been paid for it. Heck I would have been happy if anyone had even contacted me and apologized and offered me some small token, but none was offered, and whoever the scheduler was that I told I wasn't sure I ever wanted to do a Coyle's again after the bad experience just took me out of their email list rotation which for the moment is fine because frankly I don't want to work that hard for any meal even for the $80.00 meal that we had, which was very good, but still not worth that much hassle.

@aprilredbird wrote:

Lucky you, not sure who you do shops for as all my restaurant shops except a few fast food places are narrative heavy.

There is a HUGE world of mystery shopping out there. Restaurants are only a drop in the bucket.
Also I do restaurant video shops that rarely require any narrative at all or very minimal.

I'm in agreement with bgriffin. I personally steer myself toward shops that don't require any or much narrative, because I find myself putting the narrative-heavy shops off and procrastinating on them. Even avoiding narrative-heavy shops, or taking only a select few, I do just fine for myself. There's a little something out there for everyone.

It had been a few years for me, too, and this summer I started seeing kid-friendly shops in the area. The two we have done, for two different clients, were much shorter than what I remembered from the kid-free ones we used to do seven to ten years ago.