Ipsos Pay Late Again?

Is anyone else missing their Ipsos pay? I hope this doesn’t become more common. I hope they’re not cutting corners in their admin departments, too (since emails to their general box are even less likely to be replied to, I’m guessing they are reducing staff there too, or have vacancies to fill).

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I guess I received an email update as I was submitting my post. They sorta blame it on PayPal but don’t quite say it’s because of a PayPal issue.

Just received an email 2 minutes ago at 559pm EST, wanted to check the board it wasn't just me.

-deleted by author-

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/21/2022 10:13PM by JohnInNC.

@Notme2021 wrote:

They sorta blame it on PayPal but don’t quite say it’s because of a PayPal issue.

Notme2021: I "did" notice Chime sent me an email two/three days ago that yesterday was officially Juneteenth, which is a recognized Federal Holiday.only since last year. Banks closed yesterday "could" cause a domino effect of funds getting to PayPal by today's usual afternoon drop....which usually occurs at 2pm for me.

Yes I just got the email too. Seems like this has been happened a lot lately. Well I have a bunch of shops scheduled this week, and until I get paid I cannot afford to put any money back into them. Hopefully we will be paid soon.

For the two plus years I’ve worked for Ipsos that’s never happened. Lots of holidays are on Mondays. There have only been two payments that I was expecting that didn’t come in on a Tuesday (it’s possible there were others when I hadn’t worked the previous week, but I don’t think so). One came Wednesday and they added extra more recent shops to it to make up for it, and then this year’s issue. Not a terrible average, just worrying that it hasn’t been all that long since the previous time; I just hope it won’t continue to get more frequent. The fact they’re cutting pay at the same time just makes it more concerning. Plus I was counting on it.

@JohnInNC wrote:

@Notme2021 wrote:

They sorta blame it on PayPal but don’t quite say it’s because of a PayPal issue.
Notme2021: I "did" notice Chime sent me an email two/three days ago that yesterday was officially Juneteenth, which is a recognized Federal Holiday.only since last year. Banks closed yesterday "could" cause a domino effect of funds getting to PayPal by today's usual afternoon drop....which usually occurs at 2pm for me.

I don't want to sound like a Debbie downer, but I got paid yesterday via Paypal from Intellishop and Market Force (who pays differently) did deposit into my account yesterday, the 20th, a bank holiday. Does it smell like it wasn't PayPal or the bank ? Yes.

Is pay for ipsos on shop metrics and sassie the same? I am waiting on payments from both. I have never paid attention to when I got paid from Ipsos from either 3 platforms I do shops for. I just always figured within 10 days from shop acceptance and never noticed if I got paid in a pattern from them. Lol.

Kimberly Wilson

Yes, they pay separately, but at the same time and are labelled differently. I was expecting quite a big chunk from the Shopmetrics side and a little amount of Sassie and got neither.

I think there's an issue with PayPal. I had to do a PayPal reloadable card shop yesterday for another MS and have been unable to register the card through PayPal.

I did receive the payment issue email from Ipsos today.

“The second we're able to process your payment, we absolutely will. We are optimistic that this will be sooner rather than later.”

No promise of a payment date, either.

This is a $2.4B company. $2,400,000,000.

And yet they lack the resources to acquire a bridge loan to make payroll? I can 110% guarantee you that their C-Suite isn’t waiting for payment.

Because they are offering multistate routes to select evaluators, there are ICs sitting with $1,000+ in expenses waiting for payment that may/may not come soon.

Infuriating.

The notification email stated they are waiting for PayPal to resolve. It seems more like a Paypal issue than IPSOS.

@ddeblois wrote:

The notification email stated they are waiting for PayPal to resolve. It seems more like a Paypal issue than IPSOS.

It's not uncommon, for any entity, to point the blame elsewhere. Just sayin'.

sestrahelena opines--It's not uncommon, for any entity, to point the blame elsewhere.

Bob agrees-- It is very uncommon for a business entity to accept fault, especially if a government is involved. The model Ipsos chose was to pay quickly, which permitted them to offer low fees. Now that payments are falling behind, they may be forced to raise the dollars. In my area, I am seeing shops languish far beyond normal.

Within ten minutes of receiving yesterday’s IPSOS email, I went straight to PayPal’s corporate website. I looked through their announcements and press releases to see if any new policies might have affected their interface with IPSOS. Nope. And no DDOS server problems, no security issues, nothing unusual at all. It’s business as usual, no problems or drama, over at PayPal.

This “PayPal issue” sounds a whole lot like a “My dog ate my homework” excuse to me.

There is no telling what the issue is. It can be a computer glitch, a failed batch, anything. Wait and see if the Friday payroll comes before jumping to conclusions. This is very complex because there are three platforms, each with different payrolls. (Ipsos pays at the beginning and the end of the week). This might have been an unusually large batch or something and clogged the system. I think it's better to wait to see how long the delay lasts before jumping to the conclusion that they do not have the money to pay us. There are several different accounting departments, and even computer systems involved. Info has to be encrypted etc. There are so many possible reasons that this could happen that without inside information there is no way for us to even know. I'm not going to worry unless this goes on for over a week. (Yesterday's payroll, Friday's payroll, and next week's beginning payroll) and even a week's delay is not that long. But I am working off of credit, not cash.... that's the only reason I say a week. Otherwise, it could take up to 10 days.

I don’t think it’s very likely that they don’t have the money. I do think it’s fairly likely it is related to their cost-cutting measures across the board. For example, they have reduced staff, they’ve tried to change to a cheaper system with PayPal, etc. You’re right that there’s no telling, but they are clearly cutting costs despite the fact that quality will suffer, and I see no reason to believe they wouldn’t enact cost-cutting measures in this area, too.
Do they pay shoppers on Fridays from one platform, or are you referring to schedulers or employees? On Sassie, Friday pay for shoppers is only during the Nov-Dec Christmas season.

@F and L TeleComm wrote:

There is no telling what the issue is. It can be a computer glitch, a failed batch, anything. Wait and see if the Friday payroll comes before jumping to conclusions. This is very complex because there are three platforms, each with different payrolls. (Ipsos pays at the beginning and the end of the week). This might have been an unusually large batch or something and clogged the system. I think it's better to wait to see how long the delay lasts before jumping to the conclusion that they do not have the money to pay us. There are several different accounting departments, and even computer systems involved. Info has to be encrypted etc. There are so many possible reasons that this could happen that without inside information there is no way for us to even know. I'm not going to worry unless this goes on for over a week. (Yesterday's payroll, Friday's payroll, and next week's beginning payroll) and even a week's delay is not that long. But I am working off of credit, not cash.... that's the only reason I say a week. Otherwise, it could take up to 10 days.

Zek and ColoKate - I agree with both of you. This is IPSOS' problem. There is NO excuse for missing payroll, and it happens about twice a year with IPSOS. It is shameful. As a previous business owner with over 1000 employees (and some ICs!), I have some experience here...we were late on payroll twice in 15 years, and that was an error in management (buck stops here) that cannot be passed on to a vendor.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/22/2022 03:30PM by salisburync.

I think that F and L is referring to the three major platforms that IPSOS uses to aggregate assignments: Presto, Shopmetrics, and Sassie.

I’d also like to remind people that there are ICs who have widely varying amounts of money due.

It’s easy to say “don’t worry” when you are waiting for a $16 Asian food court shop. It’s not such a simple thing when you are waiting for $1,600 in payment for a route of 50 gas station evaluations that you spent 80 hours performing.

The hobbyists who only do a shop or two for fun or free food should realize that, for many ICs, there are significant amounts of money involved - and that payment delays affect the ability and desire to perform work for IPSOS.

IPSOS has a written contract with their ICs to pay on a certain date, just as we have a contract to submit our finished work by a deadline. For numerous ICs, this is a serious matter and it involves significant amounts of money.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/22/2022 03:29PM by ColoKate63.

Hardly worth either worrying or complaining about. IPSOS proactively notified its suppliers - shoppers - that payment would be late and will be made.Late payments are part of any business' accounts payable. When they get 30 days past due - and they won't - then there will be reason to be concerned.

Its likely just the case that IPSOS forgot that Monday was a holiday and did not transfer funds from their treasury to PayPal in time for PayPal to make the distributions on Tuesday.

Anyone whose business - that of a professional shopper - is so under capitalized that they cannot deal with a late payment from a single customer - IPSOS - a payment which hardly very past due, ought consider whether they are suited to be in business.

@salisburync wrote:

Zek and ColoKate - I agree with both of you. This is IPSOS' problem. There is NO excuse for missing payroll, and it happens about twice a year with IPSOS. It is shameful.

Do you have any evidence whatsoever that IPSOS did not pay its employees? You aren't an employee, you are a business which has a single customer which is past due (by only one day at this point) on its accounts payable to you.

To further add to the confusion some states (NJ among them) celebrated Juneteenth last Friday. All NJ State offices and many (not all) municipal offices were closed last Friday. The remaining municipal offices were closed Monday. Most (not all) public school districts followed the NJ State observance and were closed on Friday. The rest were closed on Monday. (Yes, most school districts in NJ finished classes last week or are finishing classes this week - very late compared to most states in the South, but fairly consistent with districts in the Northeast.)

My municipality was open on Monday, schools had the day off, but trash was collected. Banks were closed.

Yes, IPSOS could have gotten confused about when banks would be closed. They might have had corporate offices that closed on Friday, and later found out that banks were closed on Monday.

Shopping Southeast Pennsylvania, Delaware above the canal, and South Jersey since 2008

Yet when I posted a problem no one cared or defended ipsos except for a few nice people. This is the second time this year this exact thing happened.
I still have no answer for the shops that were done correctly, accepted, then rejected giving to reason whatsoever

I was going to say in my original post something about “waiting for the comments that this isn’t the right job for you,” and sure enough, here they come, on cue, though a day late. This is gig work. There are many people who do gig work precisely because they are having financial troubles. I’m sorry if that means some people may think you’re included in the worker class and not the business owner class.
Many people choose to work for Ipsos precisely because they pay faster and we can’t afford to wait a month.
Between the pandemic that has had disastrous financial effects on many people, and the inflation rate that is higher than it’s been for many adults’ entire lives, the effects of late payment are more likely to be worse for more people as time goes on. If you’re in a situation where you don’t even blink if you’re paid a month late, well, nice for you but pretty cruel to be so cavalier about others.
I do agree, like I said, that on average it’s not a bad track record. I do worry though that it’s not a coincidence that the occurrences are more frequent right when they’re reducing pay, they may be extending editing time on some projects, etc.

@Rousseau wrote:

Hardly worth either worrying or complaining about. IPSOS proactively notified its suppliers - shoppers - that payment would be late and will be made.Late payments are part of any business' accounts payable. When they get 30 days past due - and they won't - then there will be reason to be concerned.

Its likely just the case that IPSOS forgot that Monday was a holiday and did not transfer funds from their treasury to PayPal in time for PayPal to make the distributions on Tuesday.

Anyone whose business - that of a professional shopper - is so under capitalized that they cannot deal with a late payment from a single customer - IPSOS - a payment which hardly very past due, ought consider whether they are suited to be in business.

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/22/2022 03:48PM by Notme2021.

@Notme2021 wrote:

I was going to say in my original post something about “waiting for the comments that this isn’t the right job for you,”

Mystery shopping is not a job. Its a business. Every well managed business has stand-by lines of credit with banks to smooth cash flow when one their customers is tardy with payment. And every smart business knows better than to put all its eggs in one business; dependency on a single customer is foolish.

“If you’re in a situation where you don’t even blink if you’re paid a month late, well, nice for you but pretty cruel to be so cavalier about others.”

EXACTLY.

Not only does it belie a callousness, it also demonstrates a lack of knowledge regarding how big routes can quickly limit finances. (It must be nice to be a hobbyist who collects a pension and only does shops “for fun” and “to get out of the house.”)

I’m tired of ipsos doing what they want like not paying shoppers at all for no reason or paying late and just saying sorry. No one ever gets back. They cheat shoppers out of pay regularly for shops done correctly. In business you have to keep contracts to pay.

You’re making my point better than I ever could. Except you’re missing something. You’ve gotten in an implied “stupid,” an implied “poorly managed,” and a “foolish.”
So, where’s the “lazy”?

@Rousseau wrote:

@Notme2021 wrote:

I was going to say in my original post something about “waiting for the comments that this isn’t the right job for you,”

Mystery shopping is not a job. Its a business. Every well managed business has stand-by lines of credit with banks to smooth cash flow when one their customers is tardy with payment. And every smart business knows better than to put all its eggs in one business; dependency on a single customer is foolish.

@ColoKate63 wrote:

“If you’re in a situation where you don’t even blink if you’re paid a month late, well, nice for you but pretty cruel to be so cavalier about others.”

EXACTLY.

Not only does it belie a callousness, it also demonstrates a lack of knowledge regarding how big routes can quickly limit finances. (It must be nice to be a hobbyist who collects a pension and only does shops “for fun” and “to get out of the house.”)

I do not collect a pension. I operate a business. I am a professional, not a hobbyist. Like any business owner, I devote well over 40 hours per week to my business. I typically shop a two-state area, but regularly do shops across a ten state swat.

It is presumptuous to think that people are lacking knowledge or hobbyists. And I am hardly callous. It would be proper to remove your insinuations.

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