I recently did a shop for Sentry Marketing. I filled out the report with all of the jnfo they required. About 3 days later they sent me an email wanting even more info that I wasn't aware of. I sent back the info on the report. Then I got an email saying they wanted the info as a reply to the email. Then they said I didn't send them the info. And since they had to contact me twice they weren't going to pay me. I feel I wasted a lot of my time both in the store and also on the report which was rather lengthy.

I did a shop on Sunday and got a text today that more information was needed. I didn't send the information back in an email, I just went to my report and revised it. I haven't heard back from the editor but I did email her to let her know that I fixed what she wanted and that I answered the questions the best I could based on what happened. No response yet but I hope I still get paid.

I hate that they won't pay you now, It's not fun to walk around a store for 30 minutes and then spend another 30 minutes on the report and not get paid for it.

@judy0905 wrote:

I recently did a shop for Sentry Marketing. I filled out the report with all of the jnfo they required. About 3 days later they sent me an email wanting even more info that I wasn't aware of. I sent back the info on the report. Then I got an email saying they wanted the info as a reply to the email. Then they said I didn't send them the info. And since they had to contact me twice they weren't going to pay me. I feel I wasted a lot of my time both in the store and also on the report which was rather lengthy.

Be prepared for Dave from Sentry to come on here shortly, asking you to identify yourself to him so he can "look into it". What will probably happen next is that not only will you not get paid for your shop, you will probably be deactivated from Sentry once Dave knows who you are.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/21/2018 04:46PM by BlueMoose.

@BlueMoose wrote:

@judy0905 wrote:

Be prepared for Dave from Sentry to come on here shortly, asking you to identify yourself to him so he can "look into it". What will probably happen next is that not only will you not get paid for your shop, you will probably be deactivated from Sentry once Dave knows who you are.

That’s spot on! No wonder people hate sentry

If the information is not on the contract I do not provide the company with it. I had an editor ask if I happened to use the shop's restroom. I replied that I did but it was not part of the shop so I do not know the answer to their question. Not Sentry though.

I see many recent posts about other companies not paying for shops.

Is Sentry the only MSC not allowed to reject shops?

No, but they are the only one whose owner repeatedly comes into the forum with an attitude. Also, I'm not sure if any of the other MSCs have gone through posters' messages to find out their identities in order to deactivate them.

You're pretty much the frontrunner for Sentry apologist, though, as you have repeatedly jumped on every post where a shopper is dissatisfied with them. I'm glad the relationship is working for you, and wish the two of you no rain, no cold, no loneliness.

Edited to clarify:

@judy0905 - I'm sorry to hear about your experience with our company. Because I am not familiar with your specific situation, I can't comment on the circumstances surrounding your rejected report.

As you can see from several posts here, many members of the forum are extremely hostile toward our company. As a result, we have decided to stop asking forum members to contact us for assistance. We arrived at this decision because the offers to help have been demonized and mischaracterized by the vocal mob who dislikes Sentry. If a shopper decides to reach out to us on their own, we'll be happy to research their situation and provide an answer to their question.

Please see our full statement here:
[www.sentrymarketing.com]

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/22/2018 03:35PM by Sentry Marketing.

@Sentry Marketing wrote:

@judy0905 - I'm sorry to hear about your experience with our company. Because I am not familiar with your specific situation, I can't comment on the circumstances surrounding your rejected report.

As you can see from several posts here, many members of the forum are extremely hostile toward our company. As a result, we have decided to cease offering forum members assistance as these offers have been demonized and mischaracterized by the vocal mob who dislikes Sentry.

[www.sentrymarketing.com]

I mean this with all respect. A better response:

@judy0905. I'm sorry to hear about your experience with our company. I'd love to discuss this with you further so that I can further understand the issue, and I'd like to follow up as appropriate. I can't promise anything, but I want to make sure we followed proper policies and procedures with your situation - and of course we always want to make things right in case we messed up somewhere. Please feel free to e-mail so that we can discuss and I can look into your situation. My e-mail is _____@_____.com Look forward to speaking with you to see if there is a resolution that can be made.

****

Nothing else needs to be said. Sometimes, just sticking to something simple and taking the high road can really help. Again, I mean this with all respect. I hope in the future, you will consider a response similar to the above.

So shoppers will no longer be able to contact Sentry about problems like this once they've posted to the forum? Will Dave still assist shoppers who contact him, as long as they haven't posted about the issue on the forum? This is so weird. It sounds as if the OP's shop is being rejected unfairly. I'm not sure, based on Dave's paranoid post, whether she has any avenue of recourse or not.

Dave, are you saying you're refusing in any way to help shoppers who post here about a problem? Will you help shoppers who haven't posted here? If so, that's a huge problem. Sounds like a double standard and blackmail.

Aside from that,.... If the additional information was required for the report, why wouldn't it be OK to add it to the report? If the additional information wasn't required for the report, why would the editor ask for it? And, last of all, why wouldn't the e-mail to the OP state how that additional information was to be provided? E.g., "Please do not modify your report; submit this information via e-mail," or, "Please enter this information into your report and resubmit it."

If the OP didn't receive specific instructions in the first e-mail as to how to submit the extra info, then re-submitted it as requested, it's not her fault the information apparently got lost in the system. And she shouldn't have the shop rejected because they had to contact her twice! That's ludicrous.

Many of you have a lot more experience than I do, but I've been shopping nearly 5 years and have never received a request for additional information that did not state how that info was to be provided.

It would seem, after reading thread upon thread of shopper problems with Sentry--regardless of who ultimately was wrong or right--that there's often a lack of clarity and specificity in the shop guidelines, surveys, and communications from Sentry to shoppers.

Not to mention the fact that future posters really will have no way of knowing of this new policy unless they are adept at searching the forum and actually find Dave's threat to ignore them if they post here. Welcome to Catch-22, Sentry-style.

@jsalli - Thank you for your suggestion. I found your proposed response to be professional and well-thought out. We've made this offer nearly every time someone has posted an account similar to the OP's and over the years, many forum members have reached out to us. Recently, however, some forum members have started to attack us for making the exact offer you suggest. You don't have to look any further than Blue Moose's post. As a result, and as I fully explain via the link provided in our previous post, we have decided to reduce our participation on this forum.

Very simply, there is no reason for us to continue to monitor this forum if we are going to be treated in a hostile and unprofessional manner by forum members. There is a Catch-22 for Sentry and it goes something like this:

- We offer to research a forum members concerns and get attacked for the alleged nefarious intent of our offer.
- We stop offering to research forum members concerns and get attacked for being a company that doesn't care about their shoppers.

Some of the people criticizing us for not offering to help are the same people who criticized us for offer to help. It's ridiculous. This thread is a perfect example of why we will be limiting our participation in this forum. The accusations, prejudgement, snide comments and attacks on those who dare post supporting comments about Sentry don't exactly make for a welcoming atmosphere.

As we have always done, we will help any shopper who reaches out to us so long as they conduct themselves in a professional manner.

I had the very same response, as Sentry has above, to another poster who was just going thread to thread attacking the same poster. The decision from this Forum's Moderator was to suspend my account. Their reasoning was that I was "negative". I vote to suspend Sentry's account for the same reasons!

Time is a great healer take a rest and return renewed.....

@Sentry Marketing wrote:

@jsalli - Thank you for your suggestion. I found your proposed response to be professional and well-thought out. We've made this offer nearly every time someone has posted an account similar to the OP's and over the years, many forum members have reached out to us. Recently, however, some forum members have started to attack us for making the exact offer you suggest. You don't have to look any further than Blue Moose's post. As a result, and as I fully explain via the link provided in our previous post, we have decided to reduce our participation on this forum.

Very simply, there is no reason for us to continue to monitor this forum if we are going to be treated in a hostile and unprofessional manner by forum members. There is a Catch-22 for Sentry and it goes something like this:

- We offer to research a forum members concerns and get attacked for the alleged nefarious intent of our offer.
- We stop offering to research forum members concerns and get attacked for being a company that doesn't care about their shoppers.

Some of the people criticizing us for not offering to help are the same people who criticized us for offer to help. It's ridiculous. This thread is a perfect example of why we will be limiting our participation in this forum. The accusations, prejudgement, snide comments and attacks on those who dare post supporting comments about Sentry don't exactly make for a welcoming atmosphere.

As we have always done, we will help any shopper who reaches out to us so long as they conduct themselves in a professional manner.

The first two sentences are truly all that is needed. With the rest, you are again playing into what people dislike about Sentry and I think you are missing the point. I have never seen people attack your company for saying "Hi! I'd love to look into the situation. E-mail me! Here is my contact info . . . ." (and no, you now don't need to point me to if they actually did or have). They aren't attacking you for that - they are attacking you for what you are saying after that. It's for all the additional comments you are making about shoppers and members of this forum. Sometimes, it's best to just suck it up and not respond to the hate.

I won't lie. I'm a Sentry shopper and have honestly backed off a bit. Reading certain things that you've said about other shoppers (whether I think they deserve it or not) is unprofessional, makes me cringe, and makes me question if I should continue to shop with your organization.

If you are going to reduce participation in this forum, then do that. Otherwise, I remember learning in school - KISS. Keep it short and sweet. Don't say anything else. You should never discuss a payment situation, a shopper/their performance, never bash them or call them names etc. on a public forum. At that, the last thing you want is an independent contractor to bring suit for a hostile work environment (they can and people have in this country). You mitigate your risk there as well. It should just be a simple.

"Hi Judy! I'm Dave with Sentry and I'd love to chat about this situation. E-mail me! (then provide contact info)."

"Hi Matt! I'd love to chat about this further offline. Can you e-mail me? (contact info).

"Thanks so much for the love, Jim. We appreciate all the work you do for us!"

"Sorry to hear about the troubling experience, Mary. I'd love to discuss further. Feel free to e-mail me _____"

"Hi Bob! Unfortunately we can't discuss specific shoppers and their situations online due to company policy, but we are looking into it and will address this internally and with the shopper directly. If you have specific questions, let me know! Here is my e-mail ____. Thanks!"

When you respond, you WILL get haters. You WILL get people who are snarky back and that is unfortunately a result of what has happened in the past month. When that happens, ignore them. Don't say anything.

No need to reply. Just take it in. The only thing I'd do is to let Judy know your e-mail address so she can contact you directly. Then, leave this thread alone

Some things are annoying with Sentry- like a getting a past due notice for a shop that was actually not past due but instead since I did it on the last day it could be done they sent me a past due notice prematurely. It would be NICE if they could NOT do this. It would be nice to not make presumptuous claims like "Have a free burger on us!".............It is NOT free Sentry, I am doing WORK for my "free burger". It would be NICE if they actually answered when they text a shop offer but wont answer if there is a bonus or not. It would be NICE if Editer did not say, "We don't answer shoppers questions." (Yes really, it happened about 1.5 years ago.) I would be NICE if I could self assign and not waste my time to see if Sentry is going to make a decision. Like applications sitting in the in box for days. (They have gotten a bit better about this.) They tend to have a dismissive let them eat cake attitude at times.

@catlassy - I agree that offers of a "free" anything are annoying. That's why we stopped using this technique quite a while ago. In fact, it was based on feedback from this forum.

I'll review this with my team. As far as I know, we haven't sent anything like this recently. We haven't worked on the large burger project for over a year.

@jsalli Radom quote that are spot on! " I have never seen people attack your company for saying "Hi! I'd love to look into the situation. E-mail me! " " You should never discuss a payment situation, a shopper/their performance, never bash them or call them names etc. on a public forum."

@barbage - please see Blue Moose's post above.

See Mert's post on 12/26/2017 in which they wrote:

"This forum allows shoppers the right of anonymity. It would be nice if the company would respect that and suggest a method for shoppers/forum members, to get paid without revealing their identity - particularly when they have followed the recommended avenues."

See LisaSTL's post on 8/9/2017:

"Rather than spending time trying to out anonymous posters to blame them for every single problem,"

At this point, it is what it is. When we've offered to help forum members with an issue, there have been attacks so it would seem silly to continue down that path. If any forum member should need help with an issue, I encourage them to reach out to us directly.

[www.mysteryshopforum.com]

The history that Lisa posted in the link above tells it all.

Not quite all, LOL...there is so much more in the archives. History keeps repeating itself.

@LisaSTL - It's a pretty classy move going back to move first post in the forum that is almost nine years old. I've stated on several occasions that I regret the tone of this post and others made around the same time. I guess facts don't matter to all members for this community.

@Sentry Marketing The fact is the MobMentality you keep talking about is your own making. If you would just knock that chip off your shoulder and stop playing the victim here and let us get on with our forum, we would quit kicking you around.

Dave, Please do limit yourself...

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/23/2018 03:13PM by winemaker.

Dave, If we (the mob) painted our narratives, in the reports we deliver, with the same broad brush you are using to describe us - "I guess facts don't matter to all members for this community." ...we wouldn't ever be given a job!

I have always been paid by Sentry, and have complained on the board without being deactivated.

Facts would be a written history, which I provided. The thread belies unfounded claims of a mob mentality. Your ongoing behavior proves your lack of sincerity when saying you regret those comments. Members deserve to see the animosity you created is not new.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/23/2018 04:03PM by LisaSTL.

I completed one shop for Sentry. It was a retail shop, and the associate was uncooperative. I was not able to get assistance from him, and I put that in my report. Sentry told me I should have been more persistent with the associate. Isn't part of a mystery shop to see how an associate performs? If he chooses not perform, isn't that a red flag for his employer? Sentry refused to pay me for the shop. Like others here, I invested a lot of time and was not paid. I don't worry about Sentry's threat to deactivate me. I did it myself!

Wait--you complained about being paid?

@dulcew wrote:

I have always been paid by Sentry, and have complained on the board without being deactivated.