A mystery shopper was interviewed for a magazine:

[www.thecut.com]

Haha, it kind of does!

I feel like this is a bit embellished. From my experience most upscale places don’t allow you to bring kids, so I can’t imagine that this woman was traveling the world mystery shopping with her two kids in tow. I couldn’t even bring my kids to the hotel shop I did at the Double Tree!

A lot of, "I'm like...," "I was like..," "He was like..." I wonder if they write high-end reports with those phrases.

If they write, "I was like..." they aren't a Coyle shopper.

@sestrahelena wrote:

A lot of, "I'm like...," "I was like..," "He was like..." I wonder if they write high-end reports with those phrases.

The person is from LA. Many people speak that way here.

I’ve taken my kids to high end hotels, but never internationally for a hotel.

They did go on 6 cruises with me one year.

Nope, I haven't heard that sort of speech since my daughter was a teen. She seems a bit old to be using like in her speech all the time. And I doubt people really write like that, even in California. If she is in fact from LA it is definitely the valley. I sure hope she is not an English teacher.

Using "like" in that way is fine for conversational speech. The article was written from a spoken conversation, not written by the mystery shopper. The style is meant to be casual, like you're getting an inside peek at another person's life.

Yes, the conversational "voice" is much different from the fact-based reporting "voice".

What a fun positive article! I loved it. Agreed she definitely shops for Coyle, as well as probably others. If only for the reference to the Maldives. And I do not think it is at all embellished. I’ve done assignments at high end hotels that required me to take my young child (back when he was pre-school).

This is one of those pieces that makes MSing appear to be easy and glamourous. To my knowledge, there are not large numbers of "vacation shops" that reimburse completely for travel. Coyle seems to be one of the few MSCs that offer A PORTION of travel reimbursement, and the risk/work for the reward is oftentimes not in balance. If there are MSCs out there that fully reimburse airfare, please name them.

@MSF wrote:

This is one of those pieces that makes MSing appear to be easy and glamourous. To my knowledge, there are not large numbers of "vacation shops" that reimburse completely for travel. Coyle seems to be one of the few MSCs that offer A PORTION of travel reimbursement, and the risk/work for the reward is oftentimes not in balance. If there are MSCs out there that fully reimburse airfare, please name them.

There are several companies that pay all travel. Coyle not being one of them.

For some people MSing is easy and glamorous.

I could have been the person that was interviewed except that I only have one child and I’m not a music teacher. You can choose to believe me (and her) or not.

@MickeyB wrote:

There are several companies that pay all travel. Coyle not being one of them.

For some people MSing is easy and glamorous.

I could have been the person that was interviewed except that I only have one child and I’m not a music teacher. You can choose to believe me (and her) or not.

Let me guess, they are all the super secret companies that you can't sign up for that need to reach out to you? I have been doing this 15 years and I guess I don't take the right shops, or you need to go to conferences and network to get those companies. Oh well, I am happy with the work I do. I pay for cruises, and enjoy them knowing I don't need to critique the whole ship.

I certainly don't speak the way I write my reports either. "The guest entered my home at 6 p.m. She wore a red hat and was neatly groomed...."

I repeat:

@MickeyB wrote:

@MSF wrote:

If there are MSCs out there that fully reimburse airfare, please name them.

There are several companies that pay all travel. Coyle not being one of them.

@MSF wrote:

I repeat:

@MickeyB wrote:

@MSF wrote:

If there are MSCs out there that fully reimburse airfare, please name them.

There are several companies that pay all travel. Coyle not being one of them.

Neither of us are going to reveal that.

Let’s say it was marketforce. Not every shop is on the board. Not every shopper is eligible. We get phone calls or personal emails for these shops. They aren’t on the boards to select or even to see.

ETA even if we did reveal the MSC, you can’t just call them and get on the special list.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2019 03:04AM by SoCalMama.

Despite the fact that you didn't even say please - okay, I will bite.

LRA - which hires full time QA Consultants (they are even hiring right now if you are interested) that pay a salary (not a large one), give you benefits and pay all of your travel expenses plus give you a meal per diem (though according to Glassdoor reviews, it is quite a pathetic meal per diem that is not equal to that give to other consultants).

CHC - pays full travel for the shopper and partial travel for a "guest" up to a specified amount for some (not all) of the hotels they do.

LQA - Leading Quality Assurance - same, all expenses paid.

Those are just three. There are others.

ETA: You actually did say please, my bad. I guess I just filtered that out because your request sounded very demanding and entitled. Perhaps that was not the way it was intended. But I try to keep up the narrative here that people can - if they want - get a pretty amazing side hustle of visiting some uber cool locations that are way beyond the average person's budget - and it just takes time and patience and being NICE. It gets a little old that people are always focusing on disproving my ascertains. I ask you - why would anyone come on here and say hey - it's possible to do super cool travel/resort shops and this is the going rate - $100-$200 per night and all expenses paid if it weren't true?

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2019 03:10AM by MickeyB.

@SoCalMama wrote:

@MSF wrote:

I repeat:

@MickeyB wrote:

@MSF wrote:

If there are MSCs out there that fully reimburse airfare, please name them.

There are several companies that pay all travel. Coyle not being one of them.

Neither of us are going to reveal that.

Let’s say it was marketforce. Not every shop is on the board. Not every shopper is eligible. We get phone calls or personal emails for these shops. They aren’t on the boards to select or even to see.

Oh and Marketforce! I forgot them.

@MickeyB wrote:

Despite the fact that you didn't even say please - okay, I will bite.

LRA - which hires full time QA Consultants (they are even hiring right now if you are interested) that pay a salary (not a large one), give you benefits and pay all of your travel expenses plus give you a meal per diem (though according to Glassdoor reviews, it is quite a pathetic meal per diem that is not equal to that give to other consultants).

CHC - pays full travel for the shopper and partial travel for a "guest" up to a specified amount for some (not all) of the hotels they do.

LQA - Leading Quality Assurance - same, all expenses paid.

Those are just three. There are others.

None of those are mine, except I have worked with LRA in the past.

@SoCalMama wrote:

@MickeyB wrote:

Despite the fact that you didn't even say please - okay, I will bite.

LRA - which hires full time QA Consultants (they are even hiring right now if you are interested) that pay a salary (not a large one), give you benefits and pay all of your travel expenses plus give you a meal per diem (though according to Glassdoor reviews, it is quite a pathetic meal per diem that is not equal to that give to other consultants).

CHC - pays full travel for the shopper and partial travel for a "guest" up to a specified amount for some (not all) of the hotels they do.

LQA - Luxury Quality Assurance - same, all expenses paid.

Those are just three. There are others.

None of those are mine, except I have worked with LRA in the past.

Not mine either. As you said, neither of us are going to give out who we personally do work for… but I had to answer the question. And all of those are real and current examples of companies that pay people's airfare in order to do travel shops.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2019 03:19AM by MickeyB.

MMMM - the article was really cool and thank you for posting it. I enjoyed it a great deal and I totally identified with her. I actually have some theories about who I think the person is that was interviewed, but I don't know for sure.

@MickeyB, why respond with unhelpful information? LRA and LQA use full-time employees to do their shops. CHC offers casino shops and it appears to be on your personal ten-foot pole list. Remember this post where you described them as unethical and said you would never do work for them again? [www.mysteryshopforum.com]

WTF? Thanks for your help. And btw, I did use the word "please" in my initial post.

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2019 03:52AM by MSF.

@MSF wrote:

@MickeyB, I did say "please" in my initial post. Thanks for tossing out a few names. I had not heard of CHC and LQA.

Nobody wants to work for CHC.

@SoCalMama wrote:

@MSF wrote:

@MickeyB, I did say "please" in my initial post. Thanks for tossing out a few names. I had not heard of CHC and LQA.

Nobody wants to work for CHC.

Agreed.

@MSF wrote:

@MickeyB, why respond with unhelpful information? LRA and LQA use full-time employees to do their shops. CHC offers casino shops and it appears to be on your personal ten-foot pole list. Remember this post where you described them as unethical and said you would never do work for them again? [www.mysteryshopforum.com]

WTF? Thanks for your help. And btw, I did use the word "please" in my initial post.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2019 03:53AM by MSF.

@MSF wrote:

@MickeyB, why respond with unhelpful information? LRA and LQA full-time use full-time employees to do their shops. CHC offers casino shops and it appears to be on your personal ten-foot pole list. Remember this post where you described them as unethical and said you would never do work for them again? [www.mysteryshopforum.com]

WTF? Thanks for your help. And btw, I did use the word "please" in my initial post.

WTF is right? You didn't ask for companies that I personally work for. You asked me to name companies that pay hotel evaluators' airfare and I did just that. Sorry they didn't meet your standards for "acceptable" helpful information.

In NO place did I recommend any of the companies that I mentioned - CHC or others. And you are correct, they are on my personal 10-foot pole list. But you are not correct that they do only casinos.

Since you are so good searching for old threads, maybe you should review every thread I ever posted because I can guarantee you that at some point I have posted some really good info about companies that I do like and that maybe have what you seek.

What if I said it was Intellishop, or SQM, or Bare, or Maritz? As SoCalMama said, let's just say it is Marketforce. The point is - it doesn't matter WHO it is, because you can't just call them up and tell them, "hey, I would like to do the really cool resort in Barbados that pays my airfare, all expenses, and gives me a really great fee."

Just have patience and if this is really what you want and you work at it - your time will come. For me, it came in 2005 - and it came twice in the same year. The first was when someone from OA (which is now a bankrupt company that actually took a lot of money from shoppers when they went belly-up, like Freeman - so it is not a company that I would recommend!) offered to pay my airfare and nice fees quarterly from NC to Vegas if I would agree to do a series of integrity shops. It was a sweet gig for a while, until it wasn't. The second opportunity was when I applied to a random job ad on Volition of all places and got picked to be on a team of six evaluators who conducted all expense paid visits every two months at a certain hotel chain in North America. I worked for that client for years but this was a small MSC dedicated to only that one client and they folded up their shingle and closed up shop, which ended things for me in 2010. Those two "random occurrences" were hands down the thing that got me started, and in both cases I made connections to others that I still work with today.

I'm sorry you don't see this as helpful information but I promise you, it actually is as helpful as it gets. Giving you a phone number to some random person that commands a team of five evaluators that does a string of high end properties in Bali and pays all expenses will do you no good because that person will not give you the time of day - cause they are not looking to add to their team. And even if they were looking to add to their team, they would ask me for referrals to people that I actually have worked with. On the other hand, I believe that telling people that these stories that you read in T&L or the one posted today are TRUE and doable is, I hope, a little inspiring to people.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2019 04:14AM by MickeyB.

Oh please. You disprove yourself. You just admitted that one of your recommendations is garbage. The other two are not viable or relevant.

@MickeyB wrote:

But I try to keep up the narrative here that people can - if they want - get a pretty amazing side hustle of visiting some uber cool locations that are way beyond the average person's budget - and it just takes time and patience and being NICE. It gets a little old that people are always focusing on disproving my ascertains. I ask you - why would anyone come on here and say hey - it's possible to do super cool travel/resort shops and this is the going rate - $100-$200 per night and all expenses paid if it weren't true?

Well then a candid and helpful response would be something like the following:

"What the person in the article describes is not widely available. Only a handful of MSCs offer these types of shops. They are not offered on job boards or through better-known MSCs. The only way to get these jobs is.... They do not have an open application process for new shoppers, so it wouldn't be helpful for me to name them. You may have some success by trying the things I mentioned."

Here is an unhelpful response (basically, what you said):

"This article rings so true. Lots of MSCs offer these jobs, silly. Where have you been looking? Don't believe me? Here are just a few of them: Impractical MSC A, Impractical MSC B, Garbage MSC C. See my point here?"

@MickeyB wrote:

What if I said it was Intellishop, or SQM, or Bare, or Maritz? As SoCalMama said, let's just say it is Marketforce. The point is - it doesn't matter WHO it is, because you can't just call them up and tell them, "hey, I would like to do the really cool resort in Barbados that pays my airfare, all expenses, and gives me a really great fee."

They are offered through better known companies. Some of the largest companies out there offer them.

And the article does ring true for me. Sorry it doesn't for you...

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2019 04:22AM by MickeyB.