I had a similiar experience that I do not call "special treatment". I did a high reimbursement breakfast with a friend, have been doing it for years without problem. I hadn't seen this friend for several years, and became enthralled with conversation, for a moment I forgot I was working and honestly forgot to take pic's of food.
I get home and no pic' to upload...S___on a stick, I'll have to eat this one. I email scheduler, being 100% honest as to why no pic's (I had receipt) and report was lengthy, lots of work. Long story short, report was accepted, I got paid, but they knocked 2 points off my rating....whew. This becomes personal and companies take into account your record. Newbies need to not make mistakes, if they do, pay the price without complaint's.

@LisaSTL wrote:

BTW PCB, I am going to assume your friend was being sarcastic

The "friend" sounds like a snowflake whose pwecious widdle feelings were hurt Where have I heard that before?

Until today, I had no insight about the OP's described situation. Now, I have a potential inkling. Today, I received something that made my eyebrows pop and my blood boil. At best, the message was an urgent plea for shoppers to complete their tasks on time. It came across as a menacing pre-scolding of a potentially naughty child, complete with promises of future work for the good children deactivation as the consequence for the naughty children. I have not had shopper issues with the MSC and I have not had issues with the client. So whence this cyber-spanking/pre-scolding?!?!?

It was jolting. It was irritating. It was inspiring. It. Inspired. Me. To. Stop. Caring. And. Wear. A. Deactivation. Like. A. Shining. Badge. Of. Honor. (It also made me want to regress and send back a *neener neener*. But I digress.)

The second worst thing is that I have to wear frownies all night in an effort to force the eyebrows back into place so that I will not look like a wild-eyed toon when I show up for work tomorrow.

The worst thing is that I have acquired an indelible distaste for the client. I do not care about performing shops for this client or about doing business with the client. Truly, I would rather be deactivated than obey the demands inherent in an undeserved pre-punishment.

I wonder if the GAH-making message from the MSC who represents the client is consistent with how the client treats people in its organization.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/03/2017 11:47PM by Shop-et-al.

Okay, I knew the North Korean example would be too extreme. Anyhoo-- I do think that shoppers are exploited, because at the end of the day, if you added up all the time you spent shopping, and the total money you made, I will bet your net is less than minimum wage. This would include time preparing, looking, and organizing shops back to back. I'm not bitter, but I am pointing out that a lot of scheduler's treat shoppers poorly because it's quite frankly a low paying job and people are super replaceable.

Consider this. On another thread you mentioned working with just a few companies. A lot of us registered with 150 to 200 companies. The result is we kept working most with the companies who valued their shoppers and treated them well. By working our way up the food chain we are making a living rather than working for less than minimum wage. I will work for some of the companies considered terrible, but I do it on my own terms.

@rothers27 wrote:

.... I am pointing out that a lot of scheduler's treat shoppers poorly because it's quite frankly a low paying job and people are super replaceable.

It works both ways. A lot of mystery shoppers treat mystery shopping companies poorly because, quite frankly, there are few requirements to be a mystery shopper, no application process, no reference check, etc., and it is only one of the many easy ways people can make money, so mystery shopping companies are super replaceable to many mystery shoppers.

Lisa is right on. I'm an Independent Contractor. I work on my terms. Any mystery shopper who does not work on his own terms is setting himself up for poor treatment.

I wanted to add this. Rothers suggested we don't care or support poor treatment. It would not take much reading to find just the opposite to be true. The time we spend helping other shoppers learn the ropes then encouraging them to make good decisions belies the idea. The bottom line is large MSCs with more shoppers than they might ever need are not going to change for us. We have to make the change for ourselves.

Crying about the Industry means you need to find something else, this obviously isn't for you...move on!!

@Irene_L.A. wrote:

Crying about the Industry means you need to find something else, this obviously isn't for you...move on!!

Or, we can vent. Maybe we can effect change. Maybe we can't.

It is ironic that in this industry we are to notice and report on real or perceived issues but here, as ourselves, we might be invalidated or given the bum's rush when we report on real or perceived isues associated with our experiences in this industry.

*sigh* I will need the frownies again... *sigh*

i dont get paid to be a ms activist but i do get paid to ms. guess where my time is spent.

Thanks for the info