Has anyone noticed that Maritz editors seem to be going a little crazy lately? There seems to be a lot more holds with little to no explanation.

Yep. Hate it.

if they put on hold they always have a note asking for something. missing pic, explanation for a no or more. i hardly have holds & then usually by mistake on their end.

I think that is the point...."holds" from MaritzCX have lately been due to their own problems (many).

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/26/2017 02:40PM by winemaker.

It's getting absolutely ridiculous. If they keep this up they're going to have trouble finding enough shoppers to fill their assignments. I've done comparable gas shops for Stericycle and Marketforce and maybe 1/15 of my reports will be put on hold. Maritz puts 1/5 on hold.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/26/2017 02:44PM by Jbrz123.

I had shops put on hold this week, asking for clarification on how the associate responded to my hesitation. They wanted me to put this information in Q21 box. When I viewed the report (you can only edit Q21, but view all) I noticed that they had removed all narrative fields, except what I had written in Q21. WTF Why am I spending time writing narratives if they are deleting them? The real pisser is they deleted the narrative that literally covered how the associated had handled the situation.

This happened on three reports! I still have four of these shops to complete. I'm going to attempt to enter ALL my narrative under Q21 this time, with no narrative under the questions where it clearly states you must respond. I doubt this will work. The report will likely require I submit data in those fields before it will accept the report. I will likely have all four returned - unless I duplicate my narrative (which will be my 2nd option).

What I find thoroughly frustrating is when I contacted Maritz the team member was absolutely clueless as to why they were deleting narrative. He offered absolutely no solution to finding out why they were deleting narrative. I swear to God, 9 out of 10 times I call Martiz, it's like talking to the wall.

Another sign of Martiz employee competence....when I self-assigned myself these shops they had the shop date range of 3/17 - 4/30!! Of course I snatched them up. I had a whole month to work them into my schedule (I had requested towards the end of March). About halfway into April, Maritz realizes their mistake. They contacted all the shoppers (via email - would you believe it) that had taken these shops and asked that they now complete by the end of that week. I'm like, NO.

I called Maritz and explained that I understood their error and their worries, but guaranteed them I would complete the shops before the deadline. They wanted to pull some of them, but didn't. Now, I find myself dragging my a** to complete the last four. But, I will. I'll just try to beat the editors at their own game.

I am taking less shops due to the holds. :-(

Where do they find these editors?

I had a problem in March. Had an emergency and was traveling out of the country. Tried calling to explain and request cancel or reschedule, left messages, etc never heard back. Emailed explaining I would not have my phone/email connectivity for most of the time I was gone (disaster recovery), got nothing back. Got back and had a million emails in my box about overdue shops.

They have really gotten out of control (the editors). I have gotten back surveys/evals that specifically ask for my opinion (comparative shops). Which of the four companies were best at "blah blah" and which was the worst and why did you feel that way. The entire comparative was questions like this. Editors kicked it back to me and said that I can't say what I wrote - that I had to re-think and answer differently. I know what they wanted - their client to be the absolute best and perfect and they were not. Truthfully - they weren't. I sent messages to team lead (using that stupid envelope thing associated with the shop) - and never have gotten an answer in the 8 months I have been with them. When I call - no return calls. Finally spoke with an editor "supreme" (as a co-worker called them). They listened to my concerns for a few moments - but then interrupted and told me they have a very important job and are very busy and don't have time to talk to shoppers about such things. Pissy attitudes.

Does anyone know when the next pay check will come out (I get direct deposit). Think I will deactivate them once the pay comes through. Tired or their ignorance and arrogance

@FrostyBubbles I had that happen once with the hardware/gardening store. The employee didn't do that good of a job and I put in exactly what transpired and kept getting it kicked back that they need more information. I finally told them I had no more information to give them (after 4 times back and forth). I think they wanted me to say he did a great job.

Next direct deposit should be May 1.

I use to do tons of work with them, getting lots of money. Not I don't do that many jobs with them. I got some of the yellow gas station for next month and hope I don't regret it.

I have to disagree with all of these negative responses. Actually I am finding just the opposite - very few holds. Either I am getting better or I have had no new editors to break in. Even the last 30 or so seashore gas shops have gone through with no red cards and that used to be my biggest gripe. So much so that I got tired of debating and stopped doing then for a while. Maybe I just wore down the editors. Up until this month I have found that they got tighter with their bonuses. And it still annoys me that the supervisors do not give a prompt yes or no when I request a bonus. I have to assume that it is a no if I don't hear in a couple of days and move on.

@LIJake wrote:

I have to disagree with all of these negative responses. Actually I am finding just the opposite - very few holds.

Same here. Whenever I get a hold, it's usually because I accidentally uploaded the wrong photo. Out of the past 100 shops I completed for them, I would say I had about 4-5 holds. I think taking a bunch of different photos is the key. When it comes time to upload the photos, I always have several to choose from.

There are too many of us in the string alone that are having issues with holds. It is clearly an issue with the Maritz editors right now.

To add to my earlier monologue. I submitted another cell shop report tonight. This time I left all the narrative boxes empty. It did not state comments were optional. I only answered the two hesitation questions and was able to submit the report.

I determined that instead of fixing their report by adding "comments optional", they have shoppers write narrative...which the editors delete! I've seen this in my last three holds. They delete all the narrative and then ask for clarification. This crap pisses me off. Why trick us into writing narrative when it is not required.

I have gotten some clarifications that directly contradict their written instructions. In these cases, I have taken to taking a picture of the book page containing the instructions, uploading that, and commenting in the comments section. So far no issues with that, and even an apology call from an editor.

Well, I've been performing "Blue" gas station shops over the past few months and have not experienced any holds. My belief is that I have come accustomed to what the editors needs and wants to see. Plus they (the editors) are now comfortable with the first quarter guidelines.

However, a new round of "Yellow" gas stations begins in May. I have not seen the latest guidelines to check for anything new. But, I am assuming that there shall be some "holds" as both the editors and I seat ourselves into these new shops.

Whatever. I review my photos on my laptop before leaving the shop, take any extra ones, if I deem my photo not good enough and move on. Sometimes you have to keep the best for last.

If you get my drift.

I guess I should have added a little more info in what I commented about. The shops I am talking about are the cell shops that are brand new - they are competitive shops. You shop four different carriers and the primary part of the shop was the new release of a new phone (pre-order). This was something new for Maritz - they had never done anything like this. Neither had I. So you visit 4 cell shops and do an eval on each of them and then you have a 5th eval to compare the four. That 5th eval is primarily all subjective and opinion of the shopper. Apparently, the editors were not trained or did not read the instructions/guidelines on this type of shop because most everyone got their comparison shops kicked back wanting different answers and saying we cannot give our opinions and to re think our answers and such.

I have never had a shop returned prior to this group from Maritz or any other company. My shopper score is a 10 on every shop I have done since starting mystery shopping.

I think this was just something so new to the editors and the shoppers and with no training and the instructions/guidelines not being as specific as what the client was looking for. I don't know if they go over the guidelines and survey with the client before putting it on the job board, but this is a good lesson to take away from this experience - they should!

Up until this group of shops, I enjoyed working with this company and did well with them. But doing 15 shops in 3 days just for this project and have them kicked back when I followed all the instructions was frustrating and very time consuming.

Sorry about the earlier rant - frustration because I followed directions, then the rules change and lack of sleep to re-write..... Back to the happy me now that it is over!!!!!!

@FrostyBubbles wrote:

I have never had a shop returned prior to this group from Maritz or any other company. My shopper score is a 10 on every shop I have done since starting mystery shopping.

maritz doesn't post scores & i think they don't use 1-10 scale.

@MSNinja wrote:

@FrostyBubbles wrote:

maritz doesn't post scores & i think they don't use 1-10 scale.

That's true, and I believe their scale is 1 - 100.

Frosty Bubbles - this is not the first comparative cell shop they've done. I completed one for them at the end of last year. I didn't have any issues at all. I'm guessing you have a new team of editors. The only issue I recall was one of the cell carrier's was actually located inside of another store, but Maritz didn't divulge this info in the guidelines. I had to call in while in front of the store. Twenty minutes later they confirmed that the carrier was inside of this store.

re: Maritz wireless shops: MaritzCX sent out non-detailed instructions on this part of the report....the instructions asked for the OP's interpretation of the store's "Brand" implementation, but 'holds' and phone calls to MaritzCX indicate confusion....no answer was given to my five separate phone calls on this exact issue......but what they REALLY wanted was the OP's interpretation of the sales associate's presentation of the brand (any one of four companies that were shopped). That was not written in the instructions, and any OP's reading of the instructions would lead the OP to evaluation store "brand", not the sales associate's presentation of the brand. I re-wrote a bunch of reports that were put on hold (to get the holds removed), yet some original reports went through with no problem....huh???

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/27/2017 04:12PM by winemaker.

@LlJake - it could be that you are working with a different team - which would mean different auditors. I have worked on another team and had no problem. Glad that you are on a team that works well with you and probably other shoppers! I honestly think it was just that this was a new type of shop for them, the guidelines were sent out with instructions (then probably the client decided on different information)....anywho - it just caused a lot of confusion, frustration and waste of time for all involved. I will take it as a learning opportunity

Oh my - let me clarify please. My post about scores are for all the MSC's that do score. I don't think I stated that I got a score of 10 from Maritz - but that I had done shops for them with no problem and that I had no problem with other MSC's - and those are the ones that do score each shop.

COMystery - thank you for adding that this is not the first cell comparison shops. Could it be that this project was done very differently than the one you did a year ago? Just wondering why, when I spoke with them (when I actually got a human on the other end, LOL) I was told by that person that they had never done a project like this ever before; they had never done a cell comparison shop before; and that pretty much everyone on this project was ready to toss their computers out of the windows because of the frustration. (And that may not be a word for word quote - but it is pretty close). Do you see where the frustration comes from - when one is new with a MSC and we get so many different answers, directions, comments, etc. It's like have 5 different sets of directions and rules and trying to determine which one to pick to follow. So I always go with what I have in writing from them.

@winemaker - thank you, thank you and thank you again for your input. It seems that you are the only person who did this round of the same shops. And obviously it was a big mess with instructions that appeared clear and I followed them to a "T". But then shops on hold because of "blah, blah, blah" - which was totally different than what was in the instructions. And as you stated - the same happened to you - no response to messages or phone calls; and what they were telling us we had to change was our own personal opinion. Maybe in the future they will not ask for subjective information or opinions, because what I think is great, you might not think it was so great (for example), etc. But actually I did give them my input as to how I felt the sales associate presented their brand, explained their plan/costs, and promos, any accessories. I still can't help but think that they wanted their client to come out on top not only with the individual shop but also with the comparison of the four. I am always very detailed in my narratives and specifically address all they request in the guidelines. LOL - they gave me a pain in my head with this and I would speculate I was a pain in their backside trying to get clarification and a resolution to the problem