Read the rules and conditions of several companies on filling out surveys, listed by one of your members. Wording like,"may pay","don't keep up with your account", "points do not add up to dollars", "points can be deducted", "the rules can be changed at any time", etc., leads me to ask, "How do you guys make money with these companies? They don't seem to be totally honest in their business ethics. Do any of these companies actually function in a normal manner? That is, here's the job description paying such amount of dollars,then an agreement signed protecting your income. I could do surveys or secret shopping. But not for free. How are we protected? Appreciate any replies. Thank you.

I don't do surveys because the ones I have seen do not compensate much for the amount of time involved. Different folks have different opinions, but I have little patience with collecting points to trade in for gift cards or blenders.

With Mystery Shopping your only protection is the reputation of the company you are working with. This is one of the reasons why forums are important, because when shoppers complain of company mistreatment, the company will have more difficulty filling jobs. This does have at least a modest effect on companies to treat shoppers properly. While the labor laws of most states protect wages due to employees, they do little, if anything, for independent contractors. Independent contractors are expected to use the Small Claims Courts to settle contractual disputes. Unfortunately the filing fees for Small Claims Court exceed the amount you will earn from most companies in a full year.

The majority of companies on lists such as are posted here and at the MSPA website and on Volition.com are legitimate companies who care about their reputation and treat shoppers fairly. It is up to the shopper to work with companies they are comfortable with. Try a small job. If you are uneasy about the company, stay away. But also work with a number of companies so that you aren't dependent on just one of them. In 2008 I worked with 43 companies. One company closed their doors owing me about $140 in unpaid fees. One company indicates they have paid me but I have never received the check and last heard, they "took care of it" in late December but I STILL have not seen the check. Two other companies have treated me in ways unfair enough that I am not working with them further. Several others I did one or two jobs for and found them so disorganized I will not be working with them further.

Hello,I have done two assignment now and got poor rating 6 because I was told that I needed to know how to write an overall summary with details and I thought I did! What can I do ?I wrote what happen but was told that i needed to know how to write paragrahs right.Help me,thank you.

jcwizzie, send me by private message, a sample of your writing - a couple of paragraphs, and I'll take a look, and edit or make suggestions, if you would like.

I am new at mystery shopping and I would like to know how to get started and exactly what I have to do. Who do I contact before and after I do an assignment? Do I need to Join anything? Please contact me so I can get started as a Mystery Shopper.

Hopefully you have marked the forum to tell you that you have a response to your questions. You need to read through the threads at the top of this New Mystery Shopper section of the forum. Nobody is going to hold your hand and individually explain to you how this all works. The information you need to get started is there and available for you to read and then come back with specific questions.

I second what Flash said. One of the things we seem to see here frequently is this type of question. Yet almost everything you could want to know is already here. As a shopper, you are your own business. You need to do the research to start and maintain that business. The resources for that are here, and at other MS forums. No one minds helping with specific questions. No one likes to repeat the same info that is already here, though. Some will do it a few times, but it takes our time and effort that we could spend on our personal lives or getting more shops (hence more income.)

Read what is here, put together some very specific questions, and then ask those. This is too broad. I am not being mean, well, not trying to be, anyway. But being pragmatic, most of us have started somewhere, and it is usually with doing the research ourselves. That part never really goes away in this business. You are always doing research, no matter how long you have shopped.

Please, recomend a company that provides online mystery shopping job.
Does anyone have an experience?
Very thank you!

There is a thread [www.mysteryshopforum.com] where this was discussed.

Here is my take on it. There are a lot of emails (spam) sent to folks telling them they can make money by mystery shopping on line. These are pretty uniformly lures to get folks to sign up with a lot of 'deals' and 'trial periods' that have nothing to do with mystery shopping and ultimately are to lead to a 'free laptop' or '$500 gift certificate' that no one ever manages to get to because the expense of 'deals' and 'trial periods' is prohibitively expensive and annoying. Meanwhile the hope that there is an 'on line shopping' lingers.

I have made money on line with surveys from Pine Cone Research. They used to pay $5 per survey and would give you 1-2 surveys per month (it varies based on your demographics). These days they are only paying $3 plus an entry into a sweepstakes so I rarely bother with them. Other survey companies pay in points or sweepstakes and you have to accumulate a lot of points to ever have them issue a check or a payment to your PayPal account.

There are some regular mystery shopping companies that on occasion will have you make an online purchase, have it shipped to you and you then ship it on to another address. You are reimbursed for your purchase and paid a small fee. I have never been willing to do this because usually the purchase is several hundred dollars on MY credit card, I am then shipping the goods on to either the MSP or the client and waiting to be reimbursed and paid. The fee to my way of thinking does not start to justify the potential risk of the package being lost and my receiving neither reimbursement nor fee.

As a business model for you, I do not see online mystery shopping as a viable way to make money and a very high risk proposition of losing money.

TRS does online mystery shopping and pays on time, and frequently bonuses at the end of the month, too. However, all the shops require giving a cc and signing up for something that you need to remember to immediately cancel after inputting the report.

Indeed they do. When I was looking at those a while back you could only sign up for the trial period at once a year or longer intervals. I have never seen one bonused and correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe they paid about $5. They sort of disappeared from my radar because I don't want/need/use online postage, DVD rentals and fax services.

Flash, thanks for respond. That was fair enough. I will be looking for something else.

Just be very careful because there are a whole lot of folks out there preying on people who want to make an honest buck in a free lance capacity. I have found that mystery shopping has been overall productive but absolutely do not and would not spend money on certifications, paying companies to 'schedule me' jobs, paying to 'teach' me how to do it or 'sending leads'. These are pretty uniformly rip offs. Use the free list of companies to sign up with here or at Volition.com. Use Jobslinger.com (also free) to find companies currently working in your area. And yes, this in part is not 'work at home' because you do need to go out and do the observations, but the majority of the work is at home in finding, studying, reporting and keeping track of jobs. Plan your errands around your shops and the trip makes sense on a number of levels

I get a lot of bonus offers from TRS. Maybe they need HI shoppers. Bonuses range from 3-7 dollars.

I'm wanting to get into shopping and I know there is not a bad question. I have a few so here goes.
1. I look at wed sites and I read what people say about the company. What I don't see is how do I get paid?
2. I see that I must buy a membership. Do all company's work this way?
Thank you for any help with these two questions.

1. After you perform a shop you report it, usually online at their website. You submit your receipt or proof(s) of visit, usually as an upload with your report. Within a few days, usually, an editor reviews your work and either accepts your job (and sometimes sends you a grade by email), contacts you for clarification by email or phone, or rejects your shop (and usually notifies by email). You need to watch your email or answering machine to respond ASAP to requests for additional information.

Once the shop is finished with the editor, it is sent on along to the client. Your job is now on its way to being paid, which will usually take 4-6 weeks. When you register with a company you will have agreed to payment by Paypal (and given them your Paypal account number), direct deposit (and given them the routing number and account number) or by check. Generally if you are being paid by Paypal an email will be generated when the money goes into your account.

Very few companies require you to submit a separate invoice, but some will not pay without you submitting an invoice, so watch for that requirement in instructions.

2. You NEVER need to buy any sort of membership. If you are looking at companies or 'services' that charge a fee, back away because you are about to be scammed. There are free lists of legitimate companies to work with. See the first thread in the Mystery Shopping Company Discussion section of this forum.