Hello all, my name is Maria and I have been doing mystery shopping for three years now. In the beginning I was not sold out to it or fully persuaded, now I completely put my head in it and it just seems slow. I guess what I am saying is I never really got the hang of it, the know how. That is why I decided to join this forum, i need help getting jobs, staying motivated, and learning how to do this period. Any advice I can get I will take. Thank you all.

Maria - Welcome. Since you've been shopping for three years now, you already have a lot of experience.

To make more money, you will have to be better organized and do more work. There are not very many better paying jobs, so think about how to get more jobs paying in the medium range and get them done more efficiently. If you get a chance for a better paying job, of course you'll jump on it. But most of your jobs are not going to be big bucks, so you need to string a bunch of them together on any given day.

You need to learn how to figure driving time, shopping time, and reporting time. On driving time, I'm not just talking about the straight line distance measured town to town on your route. You also have to allow for job to job driving within a town, and you have to allow for search time if you're not familiar with your route. GPS's and on line maps can sometimes be no better than a bad joke on finding what you need.

You will need to allow time for each shop, and time to make notes on the shop in your car before going to the next shop.

When making up your schedule, keep reporting time and reporting deadlines in mind. Some companies will give you extensions if you check with your scheduler or the company ahead of time and make a request. Some will be very strict - if you miss your report time you may not get paid, or you may incur a penalty.

After you set your schedule for a day and you know when you have to leave home, make arrangements to get up and get out of the house. Punch your own timeclock. You're in charge. Don't screw up your own show.

Sign up with a lot of companies. This is the only way to have access to jobs. They don't give jobs to strangers.

Read the forum. When you find a really helpful poster, click on their name and you can access a page where you can read all their posts.

Your desire to do better means you can. Stay after it, and best of luck.

My name is Millicent Greenway and I am in the UK so I agree with a lot of the things you have said sometimes the jobs are just not available so I have signed with more than one site so the jobs are always on offer and I can pick, choose and refuse which ones I want to do.

Have the attitude that you are getting paid to shop and eat for free(with just a little work when you get home filling out reports=) Maybe this will inspire you... Just this week I was able to eat out all 5 nights for free. I was lucky enough to have Wing Stop Monday, B.J's Tuesday, El Torito Wednesday,El Pollo Loco Thursday and Soup Plantation Friday and YardHouse Saturday. Before I got into mystery shopping I barely ate out because I just couldn't afford it all the time. I feel blessed now that I'm able to do this. Not everyone knows how to get into mystery shopping. Don't give up... Shopping in the desert in Socal CA...

Thank you Amy, I truely appriciate the encouragement. It is just the long wait for payment that gets me at times. I don't currently have a full time job, so I am trying to figure out a way to do it full time for now if it is at all possible. I enjoy the acting part of this job and with everything else, I am getting better with it the more I do it. Sometimes I find myself glued to the computer to quickly catch a shop that is open before anyone else gets it. Because I am full time in this, it is hard to spend money on and have to wait 30 to 45 days to get paid back. I will stick to it though and see were it takes me. I joined this forum for more help in every area of it and so far it as been great. Thank you again Amy and have a blessed day.

Maria

uamylicious88 Wrote:
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> Have the attitude that you are getting paid to
> shop and eat for free(with just a little work when
> you get home filling out reports=) Maybe this
> will inspire you... Just this week I was able to
> eat out all 5 nights for free. I was lucky enough
> to have Wing Stop Monday, B.J's Tuesday, El Torito
> Wednesday,El Pollo Loco Thursday and Soup
> Plantation Friday and YardHouse Saturday. Before I
> got into mystery shopping I barely ate out because
> I just couldn't afford it all the time. I feel
> blessed now that I'm able to do this. Not everyone
> knows how to get into mystery shopping. Don't give
> up... Shopping in the desert in Socal CA...

Mar7895..you need to sign up with a couple companies that pay quickly. It is so easy to get discouraged waiting on that pay. Try CRI and Maritz. They pay relatively quickly. Once you get some pay going regularly then you can also take the assignments that take longer for a check and it won't hurt as bad.

Good luck to ya.

SecretAgentMom Wrote:
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> Mar7895..you need to sign up with a couple
> companies that pay quickly. It is so easy to get
> discouraged waiting on that pay. Try CRI and
> Maritz. They pay relatively quickly. Once you get
> some pay going regularly then you can also take
> the assignments that take longer for a check and
> it won't hurt as bad.
>
> Good luck to ya.


Also, to keep the satisfaction level up, once you're more familiar with different companies and their varied payment policies, avoid reimbursement-only or shops with large spending requirements for companies with long pay cycles.

I don't have as much of an issue waiting on contractor pay, as I'm not actually out anything. But, if a company takes longer than around 45 days to pay, I usually avoid spending more than $2/shop, since I will be out that money for 2 months or more.