Hello, All! I am just wondering if anyone out there could tell me what Coyle survey reports are like? Thank you, Night Owl at 10:58 AM

They are fairly strict and want text in all comment boxes even it's just a yes/no. But it also depends on the client.

They require very detailed narratives and the amount of information that they want you to obtain is a lot. Be prepared to tell a full story of every interaction like you are writing a book.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/26/2018 05:53PM by Lisannez.

Very detailed reports with specific timings.

Not sure if you're asking about hotel surveys, but if you are here's SOME of what you should expect:

Reservations Call - Time and Date of call, formatted to their specifications. How many rings? Correct scripted greeting? Type of rooms available and their features? Did they ask for the sale? Closing quote? Narrative. (This alone took 10 paragraphs.)

Pre-Arrival Concierge Call - Time and Date of call, formatted to their specifications. How many rings? Correct scripted greeting? Sense of urgency? Request fulfilled? Offer additional assistance? Closing quote? Narrative.

Bell Arrival/Acclimation/Departure - Time and Date? Greeting? Assistance with car/luggage? Opening quote? Closing quote? 3 separate narratives.

Front Desk - Time and Date? Greeting? Opening quote? Room and rate? Closing quote? Narrative.

Housekeeping - Initial Impression/Stay Over/Turn down/Request - Capture images of where luggage placed. Images of room from different angles. Images of defects. 4 separate narratives. Numerous images - initial/before/after.

Housekeeping Request - Call: Time and Date? Greeting? Opening quote? Time of delivery quoted? Additional assistance offered? Closing quote? Narrative. Delivery: Time and Date? Greeting? Opening quote? Time of delivery? Additional assistance offered? Closing quote? Narrative.

Engineering Request - Similar to Housekeeping Request, except that you're unscrewing lightbulbs/loosening cables/disconnecting toilet tank innards.

Service Recovery - Time and Date? Greeting? Opening quote? Sense of urgency? Issue resolved? Additional assistance offered? Closing quote? Narrative.

Security - Test the staff's adherence to security procedures. Attempt to access your room with their assistance without providing identification. Time and Date? Greeting? Opening quote? Sense of urgency? Form of identification requested? Additional assistance offered? Closing quote? Narrative.

Room Service - Time and Date of call, formatted to their specifications. How many rings? Correct scripted greeting? Knowledge of menu? Did they ask for the sale? Expected delivery time? Closing quote? Arrival time? Temperature of food? Expectations met? Table set up correctly? Order correct and complete? Opening quote? Closing quote? Tray pick up time. Images of covered plates. Images of uncovered plates. Narrative.

Facility - Similar to room, but instead for the property.

Maintenance - Similar to Service Recovery.

Pool - Specific to the pool. Possible F & B requirement as well.

Gym - Specific to the gym.

Bar - Well, if you're up to a hotel shop, then you know what to expect.

Lounge - See above.

Dinner - See above, in addition to separate narratives for reservations process/call, management, food/facility.

Breakfast - See above.

In-Room Dining - Similar to above except, well, it's in your room, with narratives for telephone interaction, delivery, food quality, tray/table removal.

Spa - reservations, facility, treatment, service recovery, cashier - times required.

Wake up call - Time and Date? How many rings? Greeting? Opening quote? Closing quote? Time of wake up call. Narrative.

PBX - Time and Date? How many rings? Greeting? Opening quote? Closing quote? Narrative.

Front Desk Interaction - Yep, by now you know what they're looking for. Narrative.

Bell Interaction - See above.

Front Desk Observation - Observe for 30 minutes. You know the drill.

Bell Observation - See above.

Check Out - We think you know what they're looking for.

Valet - Just like arrival, with possibly additional narrative for the telephone request, in addition to the valet interaction.

Subjective/Overall Impression - Let loose with your subjective opinions. "Tell the client what they might not know."

Post-Departure Call - Similar to the Pre-Arrival Call, except that you're usually requesting a copy of your folio. Time and Date? How many rings? Greeting? Opening quote? Request fulfilled? When? Additional assistance offered? Closing quote? Narrative.

One of my recent hotel evaluations had 57 pages of single spaced, 10 pt. font text - just for the narratives, this included seven separate F & B narratives. Expect to capture approximately 40-50 images that need to be uploaded, and formatted and labeled to their specifications.

While this is not what every client requires for their surveys, it is rather representative of the scope of work involved for some/many of Coyle's hotel clients.

***Edited because 5:10 AM EST

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/27/2018 09:11AM by Professional Guest.

That is a lot of work, about like the casino shops. How much do they pay for these shops?

They have an Asian restaurant right now that has comments for every question but no narrative, with just a few photos required. Reimburses $100 and pays $8. The hotel shops generally reverse charges and pay $75+, but those are indeed labor intensive with at least 6 hours of writing involved, and you have to pay particular attention to how you write times, dates, etc. They have a manual on their website for reference that is very helpful. Getting perfect scores is not easy with Coyle.

@ChrisMS61 wrote:

That is a lot of work, about like the casino shops. How much do they pay for these shops?

Not even close to enough.

I did just a few restaurant shops for Coyle. The corporate cafeteria shop reports took reasonable times (1-1.5 hours) to complete.

The fine dining shop reports, however, took far beyond what is reasonable. I did one report that took me 8 hours to write because of all the detailed narratives for every question, and there were over 100 questions. After I submitted the report, they sent it back for more details, which took another 3 hours to complete. They want to know exactly what time every little thing happens at your table, how long it takes and you have to write detailed answers for things like how long it took for plates to be cleared from the table, how many people helped, not only names but detailed physical descriptions, exactly what they said when they took the plates away, where they were taken, and that was just a tiny part of what they asked for. I had to get my friend to help me at the table so I could remember exactly what time every little thing took place. He wrote down things to help make it easier. Coyle claims this kind of superfluous detail is what their clients require but I really doubt the client cares when you went to a restroom and/or what the water temperature was like when you washed your hands.

I would only recommend their fine dining shops to someone who really wants the food and restaurant experience enough to spend 12 hours or more writing about it. I liked the food a lot, but the frustration in completing the report left a bad taste in my mouth.

Coyle might as well have created the saying “there’s no such thing ax a free lunch” or dinner. It was exhausting.

Some people here claim they can write their reports much faster after they’ve done a few of them. I am glad for them, but I wouldn’t subject myself to the torture a second time to find out.

@nycrocks wrote:

The fine dining shop reports, however, took far beyond what is reasonable.

Please understand that "reasonable" is subject to different interpretations. I have completed over 1,000 fine dining restaurants for Coyle. I find them completely reasonable for what I receive in return.

None of these meals are free. It's just that if I'm going to sit down and write a report about it, and take notes during the meal, I want a decent meal out of it...and Coyle consistently provides that experience for me. The cafeteria assignments do not, so it goes to show that there are different shops for different types of shoppers.

I'm somewhere between 2-3 hours for a restaurant report these days (I've slowed down in recent years) and for a meal that's over $150, that's worth it to me.

12 hours on one report? With all of the work that goes into timings and recording the descriptions and details, how can you enjoy your meal?

12 hours for a single restaurant report is too much time IMO. I could see it taking 6-8 hours for newbie to organize and put together, but my recent dinner was 4 typewritten pages in word, which I then cut & paste into the form as needed.

I can type that much text into Word with formatting and corrections in 45 minutes. I can dictate into a speak-to-text program and clean that up in less. That leaves me more than 2 hours to get my notes in order, scan the receipts and score the form...and still be under 3 hours.

Unless you are using dial-up, have a 20 year old computer or are trying to input this from your phone, I can't possibly see how it could take 12 hours. I'll break down my process, but I'd like to understand why it could possible take that long for someone else.

-I read the form before the dinner so I know the standards that will be scored.
-I create a new note in my phone and put special details for the assignment at the top (reimbursement limits, tipping and ordering guidelines, etc.)
-If one of the standards is not met (the host does not pull out chairs, for instance) I make a note of it in my the notes app in my phone. I don't have to note it if the standard is met.
-The only other notations I take are staff descriptions, quotes and timings. That's between 10-20 more notes.
-I also take photos of all the food.
-After the meal, I score the form based on my notes/photos, then type the narrative using the checklist as a guide.

Now....I don't see how jotting 25-30 items into your phone can destroy a meal experience. I look around restaurants in LA and everyone else is doing that without getting a meal in return.

Steve, you seem to have a good system that works for you. Personally, I would rather do my sports bars with the $10 fees and save the money. Then I would treat myself to a 5 star restaurant and enjoy the ambiance instead of staring at the waiter's shoes to see how they are tied.

@ChrisMS61 wrote:

That is a lot of work, about like the casino shops. How much do they pay for these shops?

That's a good comparison. As for pay, the last overnight casino shop I did paid ~8x as much as a Coyle fine dining AND I had one of the best meals of my life in their steakhouse. Plus I gambled on their money and won (albeit not much), and enjoyed the hotel (with minimal reporting requirements there).

Worth it? Yes, because I picked up three bonused shops for the long drive home.

@HonnyBrown wrote:

Personally, I would rather do my sports bars with the $10 fees and save the money. Then I would treat myself to a 5 star restaurant and enjoy the ambiance instead of staring at the waiter's shoes to see how they are tied.

My last 5-star dinner was over $300 and I do about two of those a month. I don't think there are enough sports bar shops available to me to keep up with covering that expense.

That said, I can appreciate the concept of enjoying a meal out without reporting. It's Dine L.A. month here and many higher end restaurant offer discounted prix fixe menus for these last two weeks of July. There's a restaurant that used to be a Coyle client who is participating. I remembered enjoying my food there when I had that assignment and so my GF and I decided to take advantage of the deal. It was $39 each for a 3-course meal. By the time we each got a drink, paid the tax and tip, the bill was around $150. While the food was still good, the service was terrible on this visit. I kept thinking to myself, "I wish this was an evaluation," because management needs to know about this! The terrible service consumed our dinner conversation because my GF has been accustomed to helping with evaluations.

Now I'm out $150, pissed about about the diner experience affecting our 'date night' and end up writing an extensive response to the management on the OpenTable site, which nets me no reimbursement, no fee, and makes me regret not just taking a diner assignment for that evening instead.

That's not the case every time, but as someone who spends a lot of time reviewing upscale restaurants, it stings to pay for less-than-perfect service at one. It's simply not that much work to take notes and write the report for me. There are never questions about the waiter's shoes and I found that after doing this for 15 years, I was able to remember all of the issues without even taking notes on the dinner I paid for. The one takeaway from the night was being able to order a glass of champagne with the meal....

@nycrocks wrote:

I did just a few restaurant shops for Coyle. The corporate cafeteria shop reports took reasonable times (1-1.5 hours) to complete.

The fine dining shop reports, however, took far beyond what is reasonable. I did one report that took me 8 hours to write because of all the detailed narratives for every question, and there were over 100 questions. After I submitted the report, they sent it back for more details, which took another 3 hours to complete. They want to know exactly what time every little thing happens at your table, how long it takes and you have to write detailed answers for things like how long it took for plates to be cleared from the table, how many people helped, not only names but detailed physical descriptions, exactly what they said when they took the plates away, where they were taken, and that was just a tiny part of what they asked for. I had to get my friend to help me at the table so I could remember exactly what time every little thing took place. He wrote down things to help make it easier. Coyle claims this kind of superfluous detail is what their clients require but I really doubt the client cares when you went to a restroom and/or what the water temperature was like when you washed your hands.

I would only recommend their fine dining shops to someone who really wants the food and restaurant experience enough to spend 12 hours or more writing about it. I liked the food a lot, but the frustration in completing the report left a bad taste in my mouth.

Coyle might as well have created the saying “there’s no such thing ax a free lunch” or dinner. It was exhausting.

Some people here claim they can write their reports much faster after they’ve done a few of them. I am glad for them, but I wouldn’t subject myself to the torture a second time to find out.

@Alaska1341 wrote:

@nycrocks wrote:

I did just a few restaurant shops for Coyle. The corporate cafeteria shop reports took reasonable times (1-1.5 hours) to complete.

The fine dining shop reports, however, took far beyond what is reasonable. I did one report that took me 8 hours to write because of all the detailed narratives for every question, and there were over 100 questions. After I submitted the report, they sent it back for more details, which took another 3 hours to complete. They want to know exactly what time every little thing happens at your table, how long it takes and you have to write detailed answers for things like how long it took for plates to be cleared from the table, how many people helped, not only names but detailed physical descriptions, exactly what they said when they took the plates away, where they were taken, and that was just a tiny part of what they asked for. I had to get my friend to help me at the table so I could remember exactly what time every little thing took place. He wrote down things to help make it easier. Coyle claims this kind of superfluous detail is what their clients require but I really doubt the client cares when you went to a restroom and/or what the water temperature was like when you washed your hands.

I would only recommend their fine dining shops to someone who really wants the food and restaurant experience enough to spend 12 hours or more writing about it. I liked the food a lot, but the frustration in completing the report left a bad taste in my mouth.

Coyle might as well have created the saying “there’s no such thing ax a free lunch” or dinner. It was exhausting.

Some people here claim they can write their reports much faster after they’ve done a few of them. I am glad for them, but I wouldn’t subject myself to the torture a second time to find out.

Hi,

I too have spent a lot of hours attempting to full fill all the questions (241) about a restaurant. I only wish I would have read the posts about Coyle. This is going to be the first and last one that I will do an evaluation for this company. After almost 6 hours of answering their questions, I received a notice that my evaluation was returned for additional information. I went back thru the 241 questions, and found none were identified as needing additional information. I then asked the company for additional information and the only answer they had was the sending me a sample of a report and the manner that they wanted the evaluation to read.

Again, I requested the company to identify the areas that they said they wanted more information. Again, I was only sent the above sample, with no identification of the problem areas of concern. This went on for several days with their reply the same each time. The result was they cancelled the shop for my not giving them what they wanted.

The end result of this entire experience was a complete waste of my time, totaling almost 10 hours, and the expense (over ($ 70) of the meal that they were supposed to return to me. After being cancelled, I promised them that I would tell 10 of my friends of this unfair treatment of a mystery company, this is now # 5 of my informing mystery shoppers of this shopping experience. My final comment, SHOPPER BE AWARE OF THIS COMPANY!!!

wow....

@Alaska1341 wrote:

Again, I requested the company to identify the areas that they said they wanted more information. Again, I was only sent the above sample, with no identification of the problem areas of concern. This went on for several days with their reply the same each time. The result was they cancelled the shop for my not giving them what they wanted.

I have read over and over they want you to basically copy and paste their reports and insert you comments into their words.

@Alaska1341, did you submit the initial report in the same format of the example?

It seems like the reason for the return may not have been about the specific information you provided, but the format in which it was presented.

The inability of people to properly post and quote is killing me here. I can't follow at all.
Your report needs to look like the example. If you can't follow directions, they are not going to write the report for you.
If it was a mid-scale Asian Restaurant, I can't believe that you could not do that report.

@SoCalMama wrote:

If it was a mid-scale Asian Restaurant, I can't believe that you could not do that report.

The mid-scale Asian restaurant, if it’s the one I’m thinking of, only has 30 questions.

But, yeah, did you, @Alaska1341, use the format that Coyle requires for their narratives when you submitted your survey?

**Edited to correct “the” to “that”.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/24/2018 05:29AM by Professional Guest.

@oteixeira wrote:

I have read over and over they want you to basically copy and paste their reports and insert you comments into their words.

If only it were THAT easy.

Usually you aren't allowed to do any hotel shops until you get a few restaurant and/or phone shops under your belt. I did some restaurants to get my feet wet and prove that I could complete the reports the way that they wanted them done, and I don't regret it. I really like doing their hotel shops. Some people do some really great luxury resort shops for them. Maybe one day I will get a chance to do some of those (right now I don't have time even if I was eligible).