Sentry Marketing

Sorry, Lisa, but what you are saying does not make any sense. The "facts" you are using to make you point is a thread that I have acknowledged was inarticulate.

The claims of a "mob mentality" are supported on this forum by the actions of you and several other forum members. This includes your irrational need to comment on every Sentry thread and the manner in which your positions shift depending on the company involved. Your actions, and the actions of others here, undermine your creditability.

If by animosity, you mean posting our side of an issue or calling out inconsistency where we see sit, you are certainly entitled to your opinion.

@LisaSTL wrote:

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.

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I do not do a lot of jobs with Sentry as there is not a lot in my area but I love to do them when I can. I have had to send in more information a few times but it was information I had over looked. The editor has always been very helpful and nice with me. I even look for jobs when I am on vacation to do with Sentry and a few others that I love to work with anytime I can.
Me2, Ctalbert. They've been one of my fave companies for several years. I understand other shoppers have problems, and I get it that historically, there was a war with no truce. Every time I've written anything positive about Sentry, I've been slammed for it. What I don't understand is why Dave cares about what's written on this forum. It's my opinion (only an opinion, which I won't argue about) that this forum is not big enough to make all that much difference. I wish it were but I can't determine that it is. It's active, and it's entertaining, but it's not the shopping world. His company posts a bunch of jobs and seems to be rolling right along, in spite of the atmosphere here. I understand that he comes here and posts because he cares about the image of his company on this forum, but I don't understand why he cares.

Hey, Dave, how's it going? All good here. Turning eighty on Tuesday and still vertical.
Happy B'Day to me. Thanks for the shops. Wish you the best.

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.
I have four recommendations for you. They go for any company with a low trust and high cheat rating.

High Documentation First. When a company has an "oinker" reputation, meaning you are most likely dealing with pigs, you place them on your high documentation list. That means you keep a copy of all original work you produce, and a detailed record of all your time and expense. You keep a copy of your questionnaire, any request for revisions you receive from them, and any correspondence. You keep a copy of the log with documentation of their comments, especially if they are false, inaccurate, or incomplete in any way. If you already entered information and they say it is still missing, you will want to have copies of all your work to attach to an email or written response, and to an invoice that you will generate and send to them with time and expense listed in your invoice on an itemized, line-by-line, basis.

Detailed Invoicing Second. Note how long you spent on the shop, how long on the reporting, how long for travel, and any shop or travel expense such as required purchases, mileage, tolls, or fares. If they are truly the worst kind of "oinkers", you do not spare any documentation of damages you are entitled to. Every extra minute they cost you to send them items you already sent, or entered originally, or re-sent by email, you invoice. Make sure it is a professional invoice with your payment address included. And make sure you tell the "oinker" in a letter that this documentation is going to the client if they refuse to pay you for work received. Then follow through. If they take your work without paying you and cost you time to collect without any basis in fact, you need to follow through and send a message you will not tolerate that kind of nonsense. Report them to MSPA, and to the local BBB. There are also online complaint boards where you can put your proof of work product in publically with your complaint so there is no question you have done your part.

Third, Follow a Breach of Contract Protocol. When dealing with cheats, if they fail to pay or refuse to correct the status of your shop after your reasonable request, you notify them they are in breach.

Under breach of contract, all bets are off, and you may invoice the client directly and report the company who engaged in the fraudulent activity to any agency you see fit. Many agencies both local and online keep a record of patterns of fraudulent behavior. Any agency with a monitoring role for criminal activity or ethical standards is appropriate, so the BBB, MSPA, small claims courts, the DA. Do not take any nonsense from an "oinker". If they cheat businesses, scrape work, and damage people economically, it is fraud, not a joke. If you are honest and you did your job you do not deserve to be treated that way, and they deserve to be exposed and stopped from making the world an ugly place for everyone to live and work in. They make the workplace a hostile, nasty place and they do not deserve thanks for it. Letting it go means they think they are getting away with it, and can continue with the same bad behavior. Send the consistent message it will not be tolerated.

Under breach of contract, you send your invoice to the company due on receipt. Then, give them the same response time you were given. If they do not respond in 24 to 48 hours, send your invoice to the client with a copy of your original questionnaire, and with any photos, receipts, or other documentation.They no longer have terms with you if they are cheats, liars, or pigs and they are not entitled to hold your pay. Under breach of contract, they have defaulted and you can collect immediately. You will file your invoice and documentation not only with monitoring agencies and professional agencies, but with a small claims court eventually for the record, so give them the breach notice immediately and note they are no longer in good standing with your company until they honor their obligations. Make sure you note you did all of the work according to specifications, that you have proof of work product, and they are now in breach. Put it in the permanent record.

The reason you send it to the client directly is because many schedulers or reviewers who are dishonest, not to mention lazy and greedy, will do what is called scraping your work. They deny your job, exclude it with a message that it had to be "re-done", then copy your work and send it in themselves for pay having never visited the location.

Other times, they will receive a payment from the client for your work, and keep it, but not forward it to you on the basis of the invalid denial. The client thinks he paid the researcher and all is well. The company assumes the client will never know they kept your payment.

When there is an out-of-pocket required, it can be just a scam to get you to purchase. In that case, you take your receipt back to the store management and get a full refund.

When you send your original documentation to the client, that is directly to the store, the store owner, or the corporate office of the client, it exposes any dishonest "oinker" behavior of the scheduler or reviewer, or the provider generally, and they can not get away with it. Even if they don't copy your work word-for-word, you will want the client to know what they are doing. And even if it is not a case of screen scraping your work, the client will be made aware of what kind of poor performers he has in scheduling and editing, and that will work against them. Quid pro quo.

Be careful taking assignments with out-of-pocket expense requirements when you are dealing with a company you do not know. Many researchers will not take them at all if the company does not have a history of reliability. If you do take them, make sure they are either nominal, insignificant amounts, or that you are prepared to pursue a fraud case if necessary if they fail to pay you back in the case of larger amounts you can not afford to lose. I personally would not take out-of-pocket jobs at all if there are any doubts about the company.

This is sad to say, but many of these companies will try to bully you because they're sitting behind the power buttons. Don't worry. There are power buttons on your side, too. Do not take that kind of abuse. Let them know there is recourse, and you will pursue it. If they are cheats they will do one of two things when you stand them down. They will pay you immediately and disappear under a new slash-and-burn DBA, or they will pay you immediately and then deactivate your account but continue to try and cheat others the same way. That's why you need to report it. Warning others of their behavior is a responsible thing to do.

Blacklist Fourth. Even if the company honors its obligation ultimately, if you had to wrestle with pigs to collect your honest day's pay for an honest day's work, you may want to note it in your own database, and note the names and emails of those involved with a source record of where those emails came from. Note all website URLs, all support email headers, all correspondence email headers, and where they are operating as a business by DBA, city, state, and zip code. If you need to e-file small claims, you will need their physical address, their DBA, and their EIN if they have one. You may wish to check for all of the above BEFORE you contract with them. If they do not have an EIN, and a United States business registration, chances are they are probably not legitimate or trustworthy. If they do not respond on request with an EIN, a first and last name, a department name, a physical address, and a landline or other registered telephone for their business, they are definitely not trustworthy. Never send your personal, private, or protected information to an anonymous internet operator.

If you do this work professionally, KEEP YOUR OWN DATABASE. Do not rely on their platforms or programs. I have seen work submitted literally disappear from an online questionnaire or online log. Keep your own records whether it is a simple spreadsheet, or a Quickbooks database. Note their payment performance. Note patterns of failure to pay for work received. Note scheduling patterns. Note volumes of work you received. Note how long it took them to schedule, respond to your requests, and to pay. Note email addresses and header infomation, so you can determine if these are attempts at mass stealing, workplace discrimination, foreign invasion, third-party interference, or if you've got decent people on the radar. A database is helpful in checking your gut feeling or intution against the cold, hard numbers. You can turn it over if you need to.

Pig wrestling is no fun, and you may want to deactivate them in YOUR database if you do not like pig wrestling and it does not make you a happy camper to deal with the contemptible behavior. Philosophically speaking, don't be discouraged. Remember, you are always a winner if you are an honest, hard-working individual. They are always the loser if they are not. Their bad behavior will catch up with them, and they have to live with who and what they are. You do not. You won't suffer their nasty consequences ultimately. Only they will. If you hate pig wrestling as many do, refer to your "oinker" list whenever you schedule your work flow and stay as far away from the piggish as you can. Pig invasion is preventible and deactivation of their contact with you can be the best thing you can do if you know what you are dealing with is a terminal or malignant case.

Good Luck and Much Success!

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/24/2018 02:46AM by Researcher01.
@JASFLALMT wrote:

Have you done any of this or is this all hypothetical supposition?

Sadly, I have had to do it in more than one instance. It is generally successful when the job has been done as specified. I can't say it's a happy experience.
I just completed a shop with a summary narrative at the end. So, I write my narrative. It's pretty concise and covers all of the "No" answers and I'm SO incredibly happy that shop is done. Guess what!? I'm allowed 750 characters and I have to go back and reduce my 1,800+ characters down. Well, it's no longer very concise. Argh!
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