I am getting frustrated with NSS, and thought maybe others may have insights that could help me.

- I have done assignments for them since 2007, NEVER have problems. In fact they are my favorite, until now.
- Did 6 Pizza shop in Feb. A record, usually I do 2-3/month. I did 6 because they call me and give large bonuses, so what can I say
- Got deactivated 2 days after my last assignment in Feb. I find this timing a bit funny. They de-activate me after all of my reports are done.
- Called them, and was told one of the shop manage to figure out that I do MS. Not sure how they do this. Could not get straight answer from anyone at NSS.
- One person would say so and so de-activate you, when I speak with that person, he/she would say someone else de-activate me, and I need to speak to him/her. After a while, you know they are all saying pure BS.
- I spoke with different people, and at one point, was told my account is re-activated because I have shopped with them for a while (since 2007). But still can not login.
- One time was told that it was network problem, and their IT is trying to fix it.
- Still could not log in as of 4/5. I spoke with like 10 different persons, and no one can give me a straight answer.
- Strange thing is, while de-activated, I get phone calls offering me assignments.
- As of today, April 5, they owe me over $200 over shops I did in Feb 2010. I am getting worried since I can not login to see my status.

I am fine if they banned me. I am not sure I want to work with NSS anymore after the amount of BS they told me on the phone by different people. 2 things I like to know.
- Where is my payment. I think it should be paid by now according to their payment schedule. All I care now is getting my money!
- I like to know how I got discovered as MS. I feel that if I make a mistake, I am entitled to know so I do not repeat that in the future. I do not hold my breath over this, just as long as I got my money.

Any insights are appreciated. I will update this thread as I have more info.

I hope someone from NSS read this and would respond to me, in private or in open forum.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/05/2010 05:55PM by sequoia.

Obviously there is something screwball going on there. They have so few clients in my area and their rates for those are low enough that I have never worked for them. I know that others have worked with them a great deal and were happy with it, but in my market the pickin's are slim.

I have been banned by one MSP (not National Shopping Service) from shopping one particular client. It was a bank and it was not really terribly surprising because there are so few customers in there I may well have been the only person that afternoon. The scenario required a teller transaction with my account and one of a slim number of platform inquiries. I had felt for months like I had the neon "SHOPPER" sign on the forehead all lit up, so banning from the client was not so much the axe as pulling the plug. Pretty sure I did nothing wrong but rather lack of traffic allowed them to pull the name off their account activity records for the afternoon.

I called this morning 4/5, and was told that everyone are in the meeting, and we cant help you. Funny I have heard this excuse before. I threatened her (nicely, did not yell or anything) that I will be calling every d*** day until someone give me an answer. My main point is, I need to know where my payment is. I dont care about my status anymore.

So here is the latest update 4/5 - 4 pm. Finally someone called me back (not sure if I should mention this person's name on open forum).

- This person apologize for the confusion and managed to activate my account - yes I tried to log in while this person was on phone. I am not sure I understand the reason what was happening - he did tried to explain. That was nice of him to apologize!
- So now I am back activated with NSS.
- I feel a little better since now I can see my status and payment - remember, they owe me over $200, and been told several time check is being processed and even if I am de-activated, I am still paid. Well, no offense, I believe it when I have the check in my hands
- Kudos to this person who manage to figure out what is happening with my account.
- While I am extremely appreciative to what this person had done to help me, it should not be like this. When it is all said and done, I called probably 15x or more, wasted God knows how many minutes, not to mentioned how many minutes of their customer service/scheduler time.
- Was told that I can not shop that one particular pizza location since I was suspected doing MS. That is just fine by me. I got enough work from other MS companies
- I have mix feeling about taking assignment again with them. We will see, maybe if it is large bonus, I will take it. It will be one assignment per month since I am very hesitate investing on them - I have to pay for those pizza first before getting reimbursed. This experience just shook my confidence with them.
- Been doing shop since 2007 with many companies. Have done probably hundreds of them. Without exaggerating, this is the first time I have this much problems.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/05/2010 08:39PM by sequoia.

Flash Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> I have been banned by one MSP (not National
> Shopping Service) from shopping one particular
> client. It was a bank and it was not really
> terribly surprising because there are so few
> customers in there I may well have been the only
> person that afternoon. The scenario required a
> teller transaction with my account and one of a
> slim number of platform inquiries. I had felt for
> months like I had the neon "SHOPPER" sign on the
> forehead all lit up, so banning from the client
> was not so much the axe as pulling the plug.
> Pretty sure I did nothing wrong but rather lack of
> traffic allowed them to pull the name off their
> account activity records for the afternoon.

I had done similar shops where I am the only person banking around. In my area, some branches of the bank does not have many traffic at all. I know how you feel. I am now hesitant going back to those banks.

sequoia Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> - I have mix feeling about taking assignment again
> with them. We will see, maybe if it is large
> bonus, I will take it. It will be one assignment
> per month since I am very hesitate investing on
> them - I have to pay for those pizza first before
> getting reimbursed. This experience just shook my
> confidence with them.
> - Been doing shop since 2007 with many companies.
> Have done probably hundreds of them. Without
> exaggerating, this is the first time I have this
> much problems.

I do those pizza shops for them at times also, but it seems to me that if you order the same pizzas all the time(out of a choice of 3) and you insist on paying full price for 1 pizza when at times you can get two for maybe a $1 os $2 more, then people would tend to get suspicious. I just would be very careful about the assignments as far as the pizza shops were concerned. I have done other shops for them, but they were few and far between visits. Good luck on you business!

sequoia Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> I had done similar shops where I am the only
> person banking around. In my area, some branches
> of the bank does not have many traffic at all. I
> know how you feel. I am now hesitant going back to
> those banks.

I figure that if I abide by their rotation plus give it an extra month, I should be relatively safe. In a couple of cases I have had my significant other open accounts and I make small cash deposits to his account so that my name never comes up (as a significant other, our names are different). But it certainly is the requirement of a receipt for the transaction and then head for the platform part that will really mess with you. And of course the significant other transaction is only game playing with an MSP that does not know what it is to protect their shoppers. So the bank calls the MSP and says they spotted the shopper--it is Mrs. Smith and the MSP looks and the shopper sent in was Ms. Jones. All they can do is tell the bank they got it wrong, they don't have a Mrs. Smith as a shopper.

Let us know when you get paid. They have a section where you can click on the link and see when the check is being processed. Two months later sounds about right for them to pay, they are not very quick. I haven't shopped for them in several months. I have always been paid and whenever they have forgotten to pay a bonus they have added it to the next check. I have had times where I have called I keep getting the run around-no one responds to my questions. It is frustrating!

As far as ordering another pizza or a larger one for $1 more, I just thank them and tell them I am on a diet and don't want the extra pizza in the house.

> I do those pizza shops for them at times also, but
> it seems to me that if you order the same pizzas
> all the time(out of a choice of 3) and you insist
> on paying full price for 1 pizza when at times you
> can get two for maybe a $1 os $2 more, then people
> would tend to get suspicious. I just would be
> very careful about the assignments as far as the
> pizza shops were concerned. I have done other
> shops for them, but they were few and far between
> visits. Good luck on you business!

Thank you for you advice, never thought about it that way....

I did checked my record because this bug me to no end I took my job seriously, perhaps too serious, and being discovered as MS kinda upset me.

This one location, I only shop 2x, ever. It was across town from where I am. The only thing I could figure out, is that they got suspicious when I ask to have the pizza delivered to Kroger (grocery store) - but in my defense, this is what NSS ask me to do. I wont be doing that anymore for sure

We apologize for the frustrations this situation has caused you. Please be aware that de-activating Shoppers or removing shoppers from specific sites/accounts is part of the Mystery Shopping process in order to supply the most accurate information to our clients. If a shopper is suspected at any location (there are many reasons for being revealed), we have to act swiftly in order to not cause more problems. In this case, we still will pay for the completed shops even if you do not have access to login to your profile. Our payments will always follow the same schedule (payments are mailed out at the last business day of the month following the shop - in your case a shop completed in February would mean the payment would be mailed out 3/31. We also would like you to know that your situation is not normal, but it is still important to us that you receive all available information in a timely manner. Please contact me if you have more questions concerning this situation.

Thank you,

Shawn at National Shopping Service

NSS- How can a pizza shop if it is delivery NOT be found out! It would not take anything for the employees to put one and one together and figure out WHO shopped them! In a store paying cash you CAN be incognito but a delivery is impossible. Unless you have it delivered somewhere besides your home.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/06/2010 01:47AM by CANADAMOMMY.

Thanks, Shawn!

But a question for you, if you don't mind. If you have 10 clients and a shopper is identified at one location of one client, I can understand not having the shopper revisit that site for an extended period of time, but I fail to see why that would deactivate a shopper entirely from the other 9 clients, perhaps other locations of the same client and any future clients. This especially comes into play where the shopper "mistake" is being identified rather than anything fraudulent. I will not ask for any discussion whatsoever of sequoia's particular situation, but rather as a general statement.

So lets take me, instead--especially since I have done thousands of shops but never one for your company. Lets say that I routinely do shops for 4 of your 10 clients and at one location the client indicates they have identified me. I can understand that the shop in question could be invalidated, but does NSS explore how or why I got identified? Or is just a client statement enough to throw me out of any future working relationship with that and any other client of NSS as you circle the wagons to protect yourself?

Obviously if the validity of my report was questioned because of clear evidence of fraud, that is a whole different issue. But I am concerned because I remember a tearful and frustrated shopper friend who was accused of a fraudulent report based on security cameras. After much protest, she was found on the security cameras due to description of herself and what she was wearing. She had done exactly what her report said she had done. The fault was that there was a time discrepancy between the register time and the security camera time--they were not in proper sync. There was a round of apologies offered and the shopper felt grateful to the MSP for actually following through to sort it out. Nobody likes to be labeled a cheat and a thief, especially when they know it is not justified. Does NSS follow up to find the truth of the situation or just decide that it is easier and better to just find another shopper?

Shawn, appreciate your feedback. Thank you for responding to my thread. Btw, I finally received my check

Sorry, for late update. Been busy lately...

I have heard the pizza shops are rough (I don't do them)...this is the Co. that I had the business card problem with. Working for them for 4 years, more the past year than ever, I am suprised, I always reach someone when calling, and my call is promptly returned. Would like to know your outcome.