When I accept a shop, I am committed to it. I will not disappoint a mystery shop client and accept a higher paying shop for the same time period and flake on the shop I committed to.

Corporate Research was canceled by their client, or they discontinued offering services to a steak house in the New York/ New Jersey area. If I canceled on them, they would cut me from their list of shoppers even though they could get another back up to perform the shop.

A shopper cannot easily get a replacement shop and may have already turned down subsequent job offers because that meal period was committed to Corporate Research. Mystery Shopping Companies should, as a compensation, pay shoppers a $10 or $15 fee for abusing the shoppers' time or risk the shoppers announcing to their fellow shoppers the name of the Mystery Shop Company, as I am doing here.

If Cprporate Research does not offer more than an apology and continues to abuse shoppers' time and causes them to lose income, the penalty should be that the UNITED SHOPPERS should boycott that company. A "NO SHOP" list should warn shoppers that they risk losing money by accepting shops from Mystery Shop Companies that ask shoppers to commit time but fail to pay for that time.


The MSPA is a group of Mystery Shopping Compamies. They would never establish rules governing flaking by their members although, if they had integrity, would require members to compensate shoppers when they flake. The Mystery Shopping companies have back up applications to replace a flaking shopper. Shoppers do not have a backup list of shops they refused because they committed their time to a flaking Mystery Shop Company.

Some companies do provide a small payment for a cancellation. Trendsource is the one that immediately comes to mind. It is not huge, it is $5, but it is some compensation for having tied up my schedule. But then most of the work I take with them is not so time sensitive that I have avoided scheduling work that was date and time specific.

I am quite surprised at CRI only paying $2.00 for a fast food shop here in Canada. I had booked myself two shops for them not realizing they only paid that amount. It cost me that in gas alone to get to the place that needed to be shopped. The did reimburse me the cost of the meal however when it came time to collect it from Paypal, there was a fee on top of that. Not very profitable to say the least.

The 'list price' on too many of their shops is so low that one begins question the overall ethics of the company. But then you realize that many shops, for example restaurants, are reimbursement only. So you look at overall value of the shop--the fee plus the reimbursement--and based on that, is it worthwhile? Evidently folks in my market think it is because few shops stay on their board with more than a dollar or two bonus, and many are taken at 'list price'. I sure don't understand.

ShopNflop Wrote:
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> If I
> canceled on them, they would cut me from their
> list of shoppers
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This has not been my experience. At all. Has anyone here been deactivated for cancelling a CoRI shop?

I have not been deactivated, although I have tried to notify them if I had to cancel. The problem I have with CRI is the low pay. I have done several shops for them that were close to home, but that's the only way they are worth the time. The Lowe's shops pay is only $4.00 and the form required is worth more than $4.00 of time.

Usually the pay is better if you wait until the end of the month. Sometimes a shop that would normally go for $4 becomes $25, plus mileage.

This is a company which you should just forget about for the first two weeks of each month. The shops only become worth anything towards the end of the month. I do appreciate their daily Commissions Increase e-mails. Saves me the hassle of checking the board. I can see the fees right there and don't even login before I notice them reaching a level where I am willing to take the shops.

While they start out low, this is one company that bonuses regularly and sometimes pretty significantly. Some people hate it, some love it. I say learn to get the most out of it .

Bibryant, we are really not supposed to say the client's name in the same post as the MSI. You should edit that out. I can tell you that the large hardware store that CORI covers which starts at $4, I have done many times at anywhere from $11 (for the one just down the street) to $23 or thereabouts.

In my area they are offering $40 for a brake check that started at zero.H ard to do these jobs with only 7000 miles on my car.