My car fills up pretty quickly. I tried putting a gas can in a plastic tote bucket in my trunk, but the smell was way too strong for me to deal with. Correct me if I’m wrong, but the shops I have seen/done don’t ‘require’ a certain amount of gas be purchased. I sometimes only get 50 cents worth in my tank before it bumps, and have never had any pushback from the MSC.

Of course, the incentive for me with these shops is the money/bonus, not for the gas itself (although it is a nice perk).

The gas is part of the payment. The yellow shops only pay 12.50 and reimburse 2 gallons of gas (~$6.50). They wouldn't be worth it without the gas reimbursement.

I just had a call from the MSC asking if I could do some of these shops in my general area (8 shops, within an hour from my home). Realistically, how long does it take to actually DO the shop/take the photos, and then get everything submitted? The person that called me said that they "don't take long" but they also said that there are a lot of photos that need to be taken...

I work a FT job, and have a toddler at home. Part of me says that this may be a great way to earn a little bit of extra "fun money" for the household, but the other part of me doesn't know if the time it would take to do/enter the shop would be worth the missed family time. I can usually do the bank shops quickly, and those tend to have incentives which make them more worth the time away (that, and I can usually do those on a Saturday when my husband and toddler are at swim class).

I find that i can do moist ga station shops in about 20-25 minutes,. The biggest hangup is when people either go inside and leave their car at the pump or are sitting in their car on their phone. Sometimes, I politely ask them if they will move their car or the CSR will ask them.

If you get good at these shops you can easily make $25-$30 an hour. It takes a bit of time to learn but once you do they are very lucrative.

I do a lot of gas station shops too. I have a system much like SpazticWabbit. I made my own checklist. I take pictures of pretty much everything that's mentioned on their worksheet -- usually so I don't really have to worry about "does this pass or not" while I'm at the shop, but can look at it as long as I need to in the comfort of my own home. That means taking pics of all the cooler doors, lubes, merchandisers, etc.

The only thing I frequently forget is the dang selfie in the vest! (oh but I at least did order me a HOT PINK safety vest from amazon! )

I am a little behind schedule in my shops, so I might have to do the gas tank thing and knock out a bunch of them in the upcoming days. Not crazy about giving the gas away, but not crazy about storing a bunch of it in my garage either!

@sweetsilence wrote:

I just had a call from the MSC asking if I could do some of these shops in my general area (8 shops, within an hour from my home). Realistically, how long does it take to actually DO the shop/take the photos, and then get everything submitted? The person that called me said that they "don't take long" but they also said that there are a lot of photos that need to be taken...

I work a FT job, and have a toddler at home. Part of me says that this may be a great way to earn a little bit of extra "fun money" for the household, but the other part of me doesn't know if the time it would take to do/enter the shop would be worth the missed family time. I can usually do the bank shops quickly, and those tend to have incentives which make them more worth the time away (that, and I can usually do those on a Saturday when my husband and toddler are at swim class).

I would just try one or two to see for yourself, just to see if it's worth your trouble. If I were you, a possible scenario would be -- you, hubby (or a friend), and baby go for a drive -- most likely around naptime -- and hit a couple of stations. Dad stays with baby in the car and you can run around and take all your pics. Then after bedtime, you can sit and do the reports. If you don't try to squeeze in more than 1 or 2 a day, it shouldn't get too overwhelming, and even just doing that many is $25 in your pocket and 4 gallons in your tank each time. And you and dad can have quality talk time.

I'm almost certain that you are not allowed to have any person accompany you while performing shops. Though, I don't know how they would know.
The hot pink safety vest is pretty cool. Mine is a drab yellow. Are they rather spendy?

I did my first couple Shell audits. It wasn't as bad as I expected. Only little hangup was the tiny CS space. They were both really tiny, and I could capture everything in just 2 pics. Felt stupid taking 12 pictures since they can't be the same.

As a side note, I had an interesting experience at one location. The employee refused to get in a pic, which is fine, but he had also parked his personal vehicle in front of one of the pumps, blocking it. I asked him to move it, and he did. But his car was a pimped out hearse that looked like it belonged to the Munsters. It was pretty cool, but the employee was a jerk, who literally said nothing during the mystery shop.

@quovatis wrote:

It was pretty cool, but the employee was a jerk, who literally said nothing during the mystery shop.

My extreme leniency goes out the window when I encounter someone like this.

I actually like using a camera, since I'm not comfortable with all the photo taking with a $800 cell, but I'm using it right now. My camera is currently history. Shell shops can be a real PITB, especially the long distance one where I had to drive back and forth TWICE to get it right. Now I'm a lot more careful and wade through those instructions slowly.

I too, prefer using a small digital camera despite being able to submit the shop on site with the new app. Reasons: It is smaller than a pack of cigarettes, has a strap that secures it to my wrist, I can take pictures with one hand, has a zoom and panoramic feature. More than once the camera slipped while I was juggling my pen, clipboard, papers and camera. If I drop my $800 i-phone I'm SOL. Call me out of touch and not with the new technology and perhaps I am.

I prefer using my large digital camera for station audits. The strap around my neck lets me write with free hands. I'm clumsy with my cell while juggling paperwork and I don't use the app anyway.

Sounds like you're out of touch and not with the new technology, MsJudi.

Gawd, you old people should be in a home!

COULD YOU SPEAK LOUDER?

Currently, I am using a Sony digital camera that is so thin, it fits in my pocket of a top or jeans or, can fit in a bra. It has a slide mechanism that turns on the camera almost immediately and a battery that lasts for days. The camera is set to take photos as required by the many MSCs. It is my second one of this type. When my first finally fell apart after dropping it in airports, shops, etc, I found the exact one on eBay for less than $30.
Besides that one, I carry with me, at all times, 5 additional digital cameras, all with fully charged batteries. I carry them for any contingency where my primary camera fails. All of them are no larger than a deck of cards. All of them were purchased for less than $10 from resale shops. They may have come without a battery, chip or charger. But all of those items can be found an purchased on websites such as Amazon.

I always bring my laptop with me and download and name my photos to the laptop in the specific file for that shop's location. In the event of a catastrophic failure of the laptop, I have a backup at home with the identical files of my shops (just not up to date photos). If my laptop fails while on the road, my camera's memory is large enough to hold all the photos of the shops I am doing on the road. I separate each shop by taking a photo of my worksheet after all of the shops photos are taken.

Is that being overly cautious? Maybe. But, I'm not about to travel any distance only to find that my camera is dead or my laptop is acting up and my cell is the alternative.

That was kinda rude!! I get the job done just fine. Thank you

MsJudi, Please read my post referring to me as being "out of touch and not with the new technology". I don't use emojis to explain my attempt at humor or else I would have put a smiley face after the same comment to you. Sorry if you find it rude.

duplicate post

And I guess not using emojis really puts me out of touch.

Oh Judi, relax. I think it was pretty clear that neither of us were serious.
Jake, it might be time to start using emoji.

Either that or acronyms.LOLWTF (an example of double acronyms). By the way, is emoji either singular or plural?

Nope. It’s just what it is.

Sorry..I didn't see your referenced post until later. I'm a bit touchy. I have a nasty summer cold and feeling BLAH. So, we're all out of touch and old .. LOL WTF....

What's the best thing to do if you forget to take a pic of one pump? I think the picture simply didn't take, and I didn't notice it. Is the MSC forgiving if I explain that, or will it be rejected? It's a long way away so I can't go retake it.

Your shop will be rejected. If it gets past the editors the client will ban you. Happened to me with the blue stations.

Did you catch the pump in an overall pic or canopy shot? Or is it a background pump which sometimes happens if the pump aisles are parallel. If so, edit and crop. Or if you are going to be in the area later this week submit a shot of any pump. The shop will be placed on hold but it should take a couple of days and you will have 24 hours after that to submit a new pic. That may give you 3 or 4 days as a buffer. I have not found them too forgiving about missed pics but them I've never pleaded my case with a supervisor.

I know the horse has left the barn for you but I always check my photos on shops of any long distance. I have gotten tired and careless on close in shops and paid the return trip price.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/23/2018 08:12PM by LIJake.

Yeah, I counted the pump photos, but I took 2 photos of one pump and 0 of the one in question, so I fooled myself into thinking I had them all. There was a van parked in front of it for a long time, so I don't have any other pictures of it from other views. Oh well, lesson learned.

Do you have a pic of the van from the pump on the other side? I'm not sure if it is this client but one of them specifically requests that we don't ask a customer to move the vehicle. May strengthen your case with the supervisor. Good luck.