@LisaSTL wrote:

Are you saying according the policy in place at the time of your shop it should have been paid at the end of December and the policy changed in the interim?

That's how I see it, but apparently they always believed their policy was at the end of the following month? The previous policy (which I copied and pasted in a previous post) did not say "following" month. But according to a lot of the posts on this thread, Sentry routinely takes between 60-90 days to pay but people do typically get paid, so I am not going to sweat it too much. I'm probably not going to go for any jobs through them in the future though since this has been a lot of work to track down a relatively small amount of money. Never say never but ....

The policy did not change. The initial policy did not state assignments would be paid by the end of the month that invoice was created.

Edited to add: You are correct in stating that the previous policy did not explicitly​ state "by the end of the following month", however, based on shopper feedback and inquiries, that is how the vast majority of shoppers understood it.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/04/2016 08:07PM by Sentry Marketing.

@Sentry Marketing wrote:

The policy did not change. The initial policy did not state assignments would be paid by the end of the month that invoice was created.

Well, the wording of the policy changed, there's no denying that. Between last week and today there is different wording but with the same old date.

Regardless, the new policy is more clear and now I know what to expect, and that's all I need as a shopper. I just need to know the standard payment dates for shops, especially if they involved reimbursements. Thank you for making the policy more clear.

I will probably keep watching this board to see if I hear more about this, whether people feel the need to chase payments from Sentry or are getting paid on a regular schedule, before applying for another job through Sentry again though. I'm not mad or anything, but this has been a lot of work to clarify policies, chase relatively small amounts of money, and all of the other 17 MSCs I worked for in November have paid me without any work on my part (other then sending in W-9s to new ones but I did that proactively). So that's my assessment after this experience.

I agree with you the original statement was confusing at best. A lot of words about reviewing invoices, not so much about the actual pay date. At least the actual policy was not changed between you performing the shop and getting paid. Changing after is just not cricket.

@Ceciliam,

I need to ask, are your assignments from the old site or is all of this from the new Shop Metrics site? When you refer to the old information, I would myself refer to the old site. I never read the new site, I was already familiar with the time they take to pay.

I always understood that the payment would not be processed until the end of the following month. So, shops performed in November 2015 would start the payment process after the end of December 2015, and the payment will arrive towards the middle of this month. It looks like the new system is designed to be a little faster. We are not at 60 days yet are we? Your original posts does not state what day(s) in November your shop(s) were performed. With the limited number of companies you shop for, you just haven't realized there are many out there that take over 60-days to pay, some take over 90. Since it appears you are out of pocket about $20, plus waiting on a few extra in fees, I wonder if the amount of effort you are expending on not trying to be understanding and patient is beneficial to you!??! Let the little things settle themselves.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/05/2016 01:41AM by isaiah58.

@isaiah58 wrote:

@Ceciliam,

I need to ask, are your assignments from the old site or is all of this from the new Shop Metrics site? When you refer to the old information, I would myself refer to the old site. I never read the new site, I was already familiar with the time they take to pay.

I always understood that the payment would not be processed until the end of the following month. So, shops performed in November 2015 would start the payment process after the end of December 2015, and the payment will arrive towards the middle of this month. It looks like the new system is designed to be a little faster. We are not at 60 days yet are we? Your original posts does not state what day(s) in November your shop(s) were performed. With the limited number of companies you shop for, you just haven't realized there are many out there that take over 60-days to pay, some take over 90. Since it appears you are out of pocket about $20, plus waiting on a few extra in fees, I wonder if the amount of effort you are expending on not trying to be understanding and patient is beneficial to you!??! Let the little things settle themselves.

I was looking at a Shopmetrics site, which is the only site I know about. I'm a new mystery shopper in November as well as a new shopper to Sentry.

Whether or not you choose to read the terms of your own business agreements is really of no bearing to my situation. If I make a business agreement with somebody, I expect them to hold up their end of the bargain and I will hold up mine. I wasn't sure what the terms were with Sentry so I sought clarification.

Nowhere on this post did I say how much I'm out of pocket, and it's not $20. But it's true that I'm not out of pocket all that much money. I also not freaking out or anything. I'm not hopping mad at Sentry Marketing or Dave. In fact once I asked about it, I received an answer that clarified things for me and so for my issue, things are ok at the moment. I'll circle back at a later time and make sure that I've gotten paid and follow up with him again if I have not.

But if there's a huge thread about this MSC not paying on time, and the payment policy is not clear, and it's the last MSC that hasn't paid me for November, I figured I would just go ahead and add my experience. I actually tried to just be neutral and share the facts rather than jumping on one side or the other. My participation here was more for the good of the community than to see any kind of results for myself.

I may be new to mystery shopping, but I'm not new to life nor am I new to business. Data tells interesting stories, and the data here is that Sentry was the last MSC to pay me in November, out of 17 MSCs and 36 gigs. I have a full time job as well, so I thought I was doing pretty well for a newbie. I definitely think that's enough data to draw conclusions from, in addition to the different stories and comments on this thread.

In addition, as a new mystery shopper, I was taking special care to pay attention to which MSCs paid me timely according to their contracts. This is a risk management approach that I decided to take as I decide which MSCs to take jobs with going forward. So it's not like I'm going to go jump off a cliff because of this or anything, but if I've made 16 other business contacts that paid me in a more satisfactory manner, it is what it is.

CeciliaM

What day in November did you complete the assignment? Was it at the beginning of the month or toward the end? I believe that the assignment guidelines state the following for payment:

Payments are processed approximately 60 days after a shop has been published to the client.

If you completed the November assignment at the end of November (i.e., 11/21 or 11/22), then it has been just over 35 days.

Thanks

Dave

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/05/2016 05:41AM by Sentry Marketing.

@Sentry Marketing wrote:

CeciliaM

What day in November did you complete the assignment? Was it at the beginning of the month or toward the end? I believe that the assignment guidelines state the following for payment:

Payments are processed approximately 60 days after a shop has been published to the client.

If you completed the November assignment at the end of November (i.e., 11/21 or 11/22), then it has been just over 35 days.

Thanks

Dave

Hello again, Dave. I don't have any more questions or concerns about your pay policy now that it has been rewritten and clarified and I learned how your unique invoicing system works. My shops for Sentry were in the second half of November, so they were on the 12/16/15 invoice and now that I understand that you intend to pay those by the end of January, my issue is resolved at the moment. I will make sure to come back and let everyone know when I have been paid.

@CeciliaM wrote:

@Sentry Marketing wrote:

CeciliaM

What day in November did you complete the assignment? Was it at the beginning of the month or toward the end? I believe that the assignment guidelines state the following for payment:

Payments are processed approximately 60 days after a shop has been published to the client.

If you completed the November assignment at the end of November (i.e., 11/21 or 11/22), then it has been just over 35 days.

Thanks

Dave

Hello again, Dave. I don't have any more questions or concerns about your pay policy now that it has been rewritten and clarified and I learned how your unique invoicing system works. My shops for Sentry were in the second half of November, so they were on the 12/16/15 invoice and now that I understand that you intend to pay those by the end of January, my issue is resolved at the moment. I will make sure to come back and let everyone know when I have been paid.

I think that he's just trying to get enough info to deactivate you. Just my opinion of course.

I agree. Plus he's up late defending his company. I don't see any other company representatives on this forum doing the same. Gives me pause.

@SoCalMama wrote:

I think that he's just trying to get enough info to deactivate you. Just my opinion of course.

He made it clear to me in email that he figured out who I was. I logged in a few days ago and was still active, as far as i know. I think Dave just likes to have the last word.

Good news: I got my payment today.

I wanted to add a little more about this as I update my spreadsheet. Out of the 36 shops for 17 MSCs I did in November, Sentry was the last to pay me, but not the longest lag between shop and payment because I had some that I did earlier in the month that were paid late in December.

The two shops I did for Sentry in November were paid in 42 and 46 days respectively. These were paid on 1/6/16 and the policy the way it is written now suggest they will be paid by 1/31/16.

I think Dave paid me early because he figured out who I was and that I was involved in this thread. He did say to me in email that he paid me early because of my concerns. Then later in the conversation he made some remarks to let me know in a sort of sideways manner that he figured out who I was. If he had paid me on 1/31/16 it would have been 71 days from the second shop date.

For comparison sake, out of 36 shops I did in November, I had five that took longer than my longer one from Sentry- the longest one actually being the first shop I did that month, which took 52 days and I was actually planning to follow up with that MSC the day they paid me. I'm not going to name the MSC here because I don't want to go look up their policy to make sure, but I think their policy is 45 days.

Regardless, my concerns with Sentry are resolved because I find the pay policy more clear now. The number of days is not so important to me as getting paid when promised. I remembered through all this that I really liked one of the places I shopped for Sentry. Now that the policy has been clarified, I don't mind the idea of doing shops for Sentry in the future as long as Dave doesn't ban me as someone suggested he might, haha.

Future newbies who read this thread maybe can take away that the payment process for Sentry is unique with a few steps that other MSCs don't do, or don't make transparent to the shoppers anyway, with running invoices once a month and doing a review process, and then timing out the payment accordingly. It appears that ALL invoices for a particular cycle are delayed for the review process even if you didn't ask for a review on your own payment. Another takeaway IMO is the owner of Sentry has a unique communication style, which tends to rub quite a few people the wrong way, but other people seem to appreciate, and sometimes those type of people get rumors and negativity attached to them when others might be given the benefit of the doubt. But in the end, he did respond to my email in a timely manner (perhaps with a few too many sideways comments) and get me paid.

I have yet to receive my November payment. Anyone else?

@rlkanner wrote:

I have yet to receive my November payment. Anyone else?

I received mine on 1/27, direct deposit from bill.com. You may want to contact Dave and see if they can help track it.