Worst shop ever completed?

The college I work for has a food pantry and I supervised the person who managed it during Covid. That would be an interesting shop! You might end up with a case of expired jars of gefelte fish.

@boridi wrote:

Haven't done this shop but I've received emails about CustomerOptix's food bank shops. $0 pay and $0 reimbursement. Your compensation is the food that the food bank gives you.

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Confero never paid me for a shop, after sending multiple emails, so there's that.

Otherwise, worst was a gas station where I needed pictures of the inside and a close up picture of the cashier. The place was tiny and I did it because I did a lot of work for the MSC and did a few of these as a favor to get a better shop (some $200 steakhouse or similar). Does ACL still make shoppers take undesirable shops to get scheduled for a better shop? Never again

A few comments on the above:

-- ACL is now mostly self-assign. A tiny number of shops (mostly bar standards) do need approval but I think that's just to make sure the shopper is reasonably experienced or understands the guidelines, as I was not asked to take on any other shops when I applied and was approved for one. The days of "do a crappy shop to get a high-reimbursement shop" are over.

-- On dining shops few things guarantee a negative report from me more than making a reservation and then being told at the end of the meal "Sorry about the awful service but we have a private party in the backroom/large group sitting over there." If I am paying the regular menu price it is reasonable to expect regular service, and if it can't be provided I shouldn't be given a reservation or at the very least I should be warned at the outset of the meal. On one recent shop I was given a soup spoon for dessert and when I asked for a dessert utensil I was told a private party in the function room was using all of them!

-- Those casinos tales are useful because there's a casino not too far from here that always has what appears to be a reasonable shop (one meal, a few games). Remembering that some casinos still allow smoking make me much less interested in doing that shop.

-- Finally, it would be greatly appreciated if those who need to insert their political rants did so in the "General Chat" section, especially if those rants are directed at a region that is undergoing a catastrophic emergency.

I was doing a shop for a small market that required a ridiculous amount of photos of all areas of the store. Whenever the cashier would appear to be looking off in another direction I would snap a photo. Out of nowhere the store owner appeared behind me and asked me why I was taking pictures. I had just snapped the menu board, so I responded that I was just taking a photo of the menu to share with my husband. She said, "well that's interesting, because I was watching you from my office and saw you taking multiple pictures." I played it off that it was just such a cute store, yada yada, quickly grabbed a random can of tomatoes for my required purchase, and got out of there as fast as I could.

I submitted the report only to discover that I had shopped the wrong location, so I didn't even get paid. And as a bonus, that random can of tomatoes I had grabbed had been expired for over a year!

Street Corner Urban Market?

duplicate

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/12/2025 07:17PM by bradkcrew.

@bradkcrew wrote:

@BarefootBliss wrote:

Street Corner Urban Market?

Yes!

I was doing a gas station shop in Oakland and a man was very upset that he was photographed. I was shaking like a leaf as I attempted to quickly delete the photos. I couldn't get out of there fast enough.

Three words - Flower Pot Audits

@Morledzep wrote:

Thank you Frugal for making me remember my one and only attempt at doing casino shops.. It was a terrible smoke filled day of hell, and my shop was excluded because I didn't understand the instructions or the way the casino multipurposed their venues. And I was sick for days afterward from being stuck in that thick smoke all day. I was new to mystery shopping, and the Prophet platform was confusing at best. I haven't done another casino shops since then, and I won't in future either.

Reminds me of my first casino shop. My partner went with me and we had to go to every bar and restaurant there. He was drunk by the time the trip was over. So imagine a very expensive steak house, a sandwich place, the bakery and the pastry stand in the gift shop. We had to spend over $100 gambling and guess who wins the jackpot on their first turn of the slot. ME, I got like 5k and after it was all said and done. My partner said that's its we are leaving, you got your money back, we are out of here. Rescheduled and came up with some of kind excuse why I couldn't do it. I will be damned if that casino ratted us out. They revoked my loyalty card and I got fired from my first ever MSC.

@gigishopper wrote:

The college I work for has a food pantry and I supervised the person who managed it during Covid. That would be an interesting shop! You might end up with a case of expired jars of gefelte fish.

@boridi wrote:

Haven't done this shop but I've received emails about CustomerOptix's food bank shops. $0 pay and $0 reimbursement. Your compensation is the food that the food bank gives you.

So long as the jars are unopened you're good and well..make some fritters.

Worst shop for me...3-tie between redoing a display at a truck stop for almost zilch payment so bad that I said "no" halfway through and do not regret it, the picture taking shop where a customer screamed at for having in the picture, and this is not a "shop" per say but....the Black Widow movie standees......

@Dino29 wrote:

@Morledzep wrote:

Thank you Frugal for making me remember my one and only attempt at doing casino shops.. It was a terrible smoke filled day of hell, and my shop was excluded because I didn't understand the instructions or the way the casino multipurposed their venues. And I was sick for days afterward from being stuck in that thick smoke all day. I was new to mystery shopping, and the Prophet platform was confusing at best. I haven't done another casino shops since then, and I won't in future either.

Reminds me of my first casino shop. My partner went with me and we had to go to every bar and restaurant there. He was drunk by the time the trip was over. So imagine a very expensive steak house, a sandwich place, the bakery and the pastry stand in the gift shop. We had to spend over $100 gambling and guess who wins the jackpot on their first turn of the slot. ME, I got like 5k and after it was all said and done. My partner said that's its we are leaving, you got your money back, we are out of here. Rescheduled and came up with some of kind excuse why I couldn't do it. I will be damned if that casino ratted us out. They revoked my loyalty card and I got fired from my first ever MSC.

Bestmark? You're probably better off.

I’m ready to exit California too. The weather has become frightening. I live in the dry dusty desert. So many fires! It is not with the cost financially or risk wise or toll on mental health to live the California dream here. It stinks because my family has a lot of work here we like. Elsewhere though, we might not be living check to check. Exit eta is no sooner than September.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/14/2025 10:32AM by rargirl.

@hbbigdaddy wrote:

There are better reasons to leave CA and that is the taxes and mindset of the voters. Single party rule by either party is problematic.

Hate to leave the stable weather, but so glad to have house 2x the size and half the property taxes.

It’s unfortunate that some people are always looking for a way to pry politics into the conversation.

It's definitely not my worst but uppermost in my mind because it happened TODAY! I was doing a de-brand in a location that was very sparse and difficult to take covert photos. When I was outside doing the front-of-store shot, one of the employees ran out to take a pic of me and my car and then pulled out a gun! I got out of there fast.

Shopping domestic and international locations since 2003.

That wasn't the worst?

@pambam wrote:

....one of the employees ran out to take a pic of me and my car and then pulled out a gun! I got out of there fast.

Yikes! I am afraid to hear about your worse shop! I've never thought mystery shopping could be so dangerous. Now that would be an interesting report ..

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/15/2025 03:55AM by AmandaCA.

If you do a casino shop and win like 5K, do you get to keep your earnings?

@NinS wrote:

partial quote from NinS

-- On dining shops few things guarantee a negative report from me more than making a reservation and then being told at the end of the meal "Sorry about the awful service but we have a private party in the backroom/large group sitting over there."

SandyF says: I thought i did not have a worst shop to report until I read the above and a repressed memory shop was remembered.
It was a restaurant order online for pick up. I was to park in the designated pick up spots and call in. By no means was i supposed to enter the restaurant. I got there and the pick up spots were all full. I was told to pull up in the one car wide circular drive. I stopped behind another car which was blocking my exit. I called in about every 10 minutes for my order and they kept saying it would be out soon. It was earlier days of cell phones and there were no unlimited calls or minutes. I was worried my pre purchased minutes would run out before the job was done. After many calls my final call was picked up by the manager. He explained to me that there was an impromptu wedding rehearsal group who showed up without reservations and took over half the restaurant so they were having trouble keeping up. I explained to him how many times I had called and told him what my pick up time was supposed to be. He promised to get my order out to me. He did not personally bring it out but I finally got it about an hour late. The manager never saw me in person. I rushed home to drop dinner off in my fridge as we had reservations to go elsewhere and it was then time to leave. But I opened the bag and saw my soup was missing too.
I filed my report and the MSC got in touch with me and told me the manager knew who I, the shopper , was so I could no longer do those jobs. It was about 4 years before another msc took over that restaurant and I was finally able to do them again.

@pambam wrote:

It's definitely not my worst but uppermost in my mind because it happened TODAY! I was doing a de-brand in a location that was very sparse and difficult to take covert photos. When I was outside doing the front-of-store shot, one of the employees ran out to take a pic of me and my car and then pulled out a gun! I got out of there fast.

If this was not the worst, then what was.

@Equine24 wrote:

If you do a casino shop and win like 5K, do you get to keep your earnings?

No you do not. At least not with this MSC. Hence the casino ratting me out.

@AmandaCA wrote:

@pambam wrote:

....one of the employees ran out to take a pic of me and my car and then pulled out a gun! I got out of there fast.

Yikes! I am afraid to hear about your worse shop! I've never thought mystery shopping could be so dangerous. Now that would be an interesting report ..

All my negative experiences have been with those pesky customers. Station attendants have only told me to leave a handful of times.

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