hi, i'm trying to get started in the mystery shopping business and recently applied with a 'company'. i got an email saying i'd been accepted and then another one with my first assisgnment. below i've copied and pasted it:


Thu, 5 November, 2009 18:55:38From: Mike Chambers <mike@mobil-inc.com>View Contact
To: inkpages@yahoo.co.uk


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Dear Applicant,
I am glad to inform you that your contact details have been received and confirmed by our team and will like to congratulate you as a member of our working team.


FIRST ASSIGNMENT:

Shopper's Guide wants you to run a survey on two prominent companies in your area.

The 1st is a Western Union Location
The 2nd a Restaurant

There have been reports about laps in the services of their Management and some If their staffs, Their complaints are based on reports which their customers forwarded anonymously and Phone calls which were also made to the head office.

The Western union location was reported for evaluation for the following reasons:

I) Customers have reported their money missing

ii) Slow services

iii) Unbalanced transfer charges

The 2nd company was reported to be rendering:

(I) Poor services

(ii) Rudeness to customers

(iii) Excess charge

(iii) Late opening time and Closing before time..

Your first assignment will be assigned to you within the next few days.

Your Secret Evaluation would be:

1) To make a transfer of funds from Any Western Union Outlet or Any Walmart Outlet in your area to our Mystery shopper,And the funds would be picked up by another mystery shopper at another location.

2) You would have to record the time at which you go to the location and how many it took you to get service.

3) You would be sent a check which would cover your payment of £300 and also for the duty. As soon as you receive the check, you should cash in at your bank, and deduct your £300.00, and use the rest of the money for the services remember all you do should be Secret your Identity should be kept confidential as the job states (secret/mystery shopper).

4) Upon receiving the funds, the locations address would be forwarded to you, and also the Name and address of whom the Mystery shoppers transfer would be made to. You would have to keep a comprehensive report on every activity you carry out.

5) You would also provide me with the name of the cashier that attended to you.

Please send me a reply if you are interested or not so that the check would be sent out to you ASAP and also please confirm your details again .

FULL NAME:
CONTACT ADDRESS:
CITY:
STATE:
ZIP-CODE:
Email Address:

Kindly acknowledge the receipt of this e-mail.

Once Again, Congratulations.
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when i first signed i noticed the use of Walmart. as i live in the UK, there are no walmarts. but his initial email said the opperate in the UK as well as the US and Canada

bottom line - is this a scam? i think so, but wanted to get advice from more experienced shoppers. by and by, the name of this company Secret Shopper.

if this is a scam, can you advise me of there to get some genuin work and how it would normaly work.

thanks loads.

jlstraw.

Scam! Run away from anything Western Union. You can find real opportunities by signing up with the companies here (see sticky in MS Co section), signing up with Jobslinger, and checking the MSPA site for job opportunities. Real companies pay you AFTER you do the job, not before. Anyone who sends you an unsolicited check is a scammer.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/06/2009 11:08AM by dee shops.

Similarly, legitimate companies direct you to their website to apply to work with them if they are looking for someone in your area. While some may subsequently ask you to put SOME personal information in an email about a particular job request to your scheduler, you will know that you are signed up with their company already. And when you apply to be a shopper on a website you will be asked to sign off on an Independent Contractor Agreement, which is your working agreement with that company. Until you have such an agreement in place, no legitimate company will be doing anything with you.

When you get emails like this, please follow the advice above. I also occasionally get scam emails, and whenever they have improper grammar, bad formatting, etc.,I always know that they're a scam. I also google the email address or the domain that it comes from, like Mobil-inc.com. Usually, any legit company will have an online presence--but this one doesn't.

Of course a problem with many of these is that they are fraudulently using the names of legitimate companies or at least enough of the name that when you Google you will come up with the legitimate company. You will note on the front page of almost every MSP some warning that somebody is fraudulently using their company name for scams or claiming to be one of their schedulers or employees.

I was just reading on another forum about a guy who was scammed with something that sounds similar to this. Like dee shops said above, avoid anything that mentions Western Union.

I always check with The Better Business Bureau first. I have about $13,000 dollars from these companies sitting on my desk. I investigate before I act.

Just make sure you are checking the CORRECT company. Many of the scammers are working under the name of a legitimate company and the checks they send out are forgeries using the account number of that legitimate company. Thus if you got a fake check from "Bare International" the BBB would say they are a legitimate company (which the real one is) and a phone call to the bank would indicate that indeed the dheck was drawn on the Bare account with them, but the check is a pure forgery and may not show up as such until Bare identifies it as such to their bank.