Hi ,

I just did my sixth shop for Maritz. They don't seem to give you as much feedback on your reports as some companies,Can anyone share their experiences working with Maritz,and yes I got my 70 pg.***** booklet.I'm about to get another manual for Cenex gas stations.So far they seem pretty good,another thing I've noticed ,they actually call you on the phone,the other companies I work for, do email for the most part.Any feedback about them,would be appreciated !!!!

txguitar-Please remove the clients' names from your post.

I don't understand ,I see their name discussed on the forum ,so what's up ?

I do several oil companies for them. Reasonable folks to do biz with. If they think something is wrong with a shop you submit,they will put it on hold with a note. If its a simple question about a response, someone will call you.
If the shop passes and goes into your completed list - All is Good!...

Like I said I just did my sixth shop and they are all showing completed,nothing else to do ,I submitted my invoice and pics.I was curious if they pay like they say they do,they say their payroll goes out on the 16th ?

txguitar Wrote:
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> I don't understand ,I see their name discussed on
> the forum ,so what's up ?

Your ICA does not allow you to disclose who the client is shopped by. This is avoided by in a particular thread (such as this one with the name of the company in the name of the thread) no clients of this company should be mentioned. In some other thread where a client is discussed, the company should not be named.

I formerly did some shops with Maritz and found them low paying for the work involved. I had problems with their gas stations with photos because some of the photos could not be obtained safely (unless you wanted to scoot between the barbed wire across the street and dance with the bulls). Between the long list of observations and malarkey with photos and photo editors, I stopped doing the gas shops. Their new gas client this year I used to do with the previous company. Maritz made the time constraints noxious but I couldn't even see the assigned time until testing and such was complete. When I asked to reschedule to something that could work, I was told they could not and so I asked that they cancel the shops and terminate me. I have not regretted my decision at all.

Their payroll goes out ontime. I got a check from them today.

Flash. I went through the same thing with them a while back. I just stopped accepting assignments for a while. I started back with them and things have changed. Very few problems. I am able to set up my shops several weeks in advance. I have been able to call on the day a shop is due, give a reason and receive an extension with out a hassle. I have great schedulers and reasonable editors. If this does not change, I will continue with them. Mr.C

I had been through the 'wait and see' period. I didn't have the kinds of problems other folks were having with the new website except that it was one more fine example of slow, incompetent and user unfriendly. I was hopeful with the email contact available on the new site--not realizing that they would not answer by email but if you got an answer it was by phone and mostly you were doing the dialing.

My final straw was that shop instructions were not available to read or take the test so you could see the assignment until fairly shortly before shop day requested. When I took the test I discovered that one shop had been scheduled such that it became a long distance orphan and the other shop had been scheduled as night time in an area I don't want to be after dark. The response I got from a young male was "My supervisor would be mad if I changed them." I pushed to speak with the supervisor and the young male indicated that they couldn't be changed and would not put me through to the supervisor.

The only thing Maritz had going for them as far as I was concerned was that schedulers functioned with seeming autonomous status and COULD make decisions about timing and bonuses. I figured this insecure young man was the new wave at Maritz and was as incompetent and user unfriendly as their website, so it was time to go.

I like Maritz a lot. They pay fast, schedulers, editors and finance folks are very nice, and when you have done a number of shops for them, they will let you auto-schedule. They have some great No photo gas shops. The bank shops are a breeze but the better locations are auto scheduled by shoppers with seniority so it leaves the branches in less-convenient locations. They are very aggressive calling about the hard-to-schedule locations - sometimes several times a day - and some of the schedulers are high-pressure to get you to schedule. It's true you get the gas shop instructions very late. And Flash is correct, the e-mail contact doesn't work - they don't e-mail back; I recently e-mailed them 4 times over a week, then got a phone voicemail saying "in answer to your 4 e-mails to us...." I have not ever asked to reschedule. My problem is getting the shops I want - you go online and request them, and, unless the shop is a hard-to-schedule, they don't call you back for a week or more, and someone with auto-schedule grabs it. If I call, the schedule team is not available. So I haven't able to do enough shops yet to be able to auto-schedule. If I can ever get to auto-schedule, I might do a lot more of their shops.

I had auto-schedule with them but they gave you a time range rather than a date and then assigned a date. Somehow I found myself doing a whole lot of orphan shops for them, which for $9.50 and a 25 mile round trip does not work as a business proposition. The gas shops they got from GFK were a nice shop. They paid a $12 flat fee with a 'minimum' purchase requirement so whatever reasonable amount of gas (usually $10 since few folks in the real world buy $3 worth of gas except to a gas can or for a motorcycle) you put in constituted an easily justified "unreimbursed business expense". Since the new jobs specify a reimbursement amount, you no longer have that justified option. They have reduced fees I understand on some long standing contracts where I doubt they are getting a penny less and even in good times shoppers did not get a penny more. The chocolate shop used to be a pretty good gig with a different MSP. When I saw it at Maritz, I decided it was no longer worth the trip. I guess I'm spoiled, but my perception is that shops that go to Maritz become 'suitable' only for newbie shoppers trying to rack up some 'experience'.

I'm kind of a newbie - I've done over 600 shops now but have only been shopping 6 months. I did some really good shops but also a lot of low-pays for the experience. I'm getting a little more discriminating now and only take the low-pays when they are REALLY convenient AND something I want. The Maritz no photo gas shops are pretty easy and quick; they pay $5 with a $5 gas reimbursement and $1 to purchase (cold canned iced tea!) something inside. Kind of low but I take only those close to home or work or in between. They schedule you for a 5-day period & you pick which day. I rarely drive more than a mile so it's worth it to me. They also have a $10 reveal gas shops but I don't want those, I don't like reveals. They posted 2 chocolate shops last month & I wanted to try them but someone beat me to them. I'm disappointed to hear how the auto-schedule worked for you - - I was thinking once I got to auto-schedule I could really pick my own shop, location and date and cut down on the phone calls. But it sounds like I'll still need to wait on the phone calls from them.

The auto-schedule generally allows you to select the week you want the job but not the specific day. Some of the jobs, like the mailing, requested you go specific days or times but did not require it. The no-photo gas with the former MSP had a day and YOU selected morning, afternoon or evening. The Maritz version I got messed up with a Maritz specified date and time. Phooey on that! And yes, once you get to auto-schedule there are a lot fewer phone calls.

I have done some revealed gas and some bank. I have gotten paid for the one still waiting on the others. They pay by check. Also, I was told need to do 10 shops with them before self-assigning, which is okay with me. Also have been bonused by them.

I've shopped with them for 11-12 years now and found them to be my favorite company to work with. They have always paid on time and they don't look for reasons to get out of paying you like a certain company I won't talk about.

Which only goes to show you that personal preferences are different between shoppers. I've known Cettie quite a while and know she certainly knows what she is doing. Only once did I have a pay issue with Maritz, which was taken care of appropriately. Yet overall I choose not to work with them while they are a favorite of Cettie's. The company that is #1 in Cettie's 'doghouse' is one I enjoy doing a lot of jobs for.

There is no question here about the ethics or legitimacy of Maritz. But not all shoppers will find the same companies to be their cup o' tea. The differences are often the schedulers we encounter or the suitability of shops to our environment. I certainly found the Maritz shipping shops much easier in my market than most found in their own because I rarely encountered lines.

I can't seem to logon to their site even though I have an ID number. It seems I can't remember my password and when I go to forgot password, I can never see the security question. Does anyone out there know what the security question is? Also, do they have shops in Canada? Thanks

Security question would be something u gave to Maritz when you first signed up. Such as a pet's name or what school you started at. It would be something that only you know. They ask that question for your security so no one else can log into your account.

RM I have had that problem too. I finally found that there is a qlitch in their system and after you try 2 or 3 times with the wrong password it locks you out, and the security question that is suposed to let you reset your password, wewill not work. I KNEW mu question, and I knew the answer, but it still told me it was wrong. The only thing you can do is to call them and ask them to reset your passowd,

My experience with different companies has taught me it depends on the people you get to deal with. If you have good Schedulers and decent Editors, life is easier. I email them pics of crack pipes, bongs and other contraband I find at gas stations during my visits. They seem to enjoy it and kid me by asking how my new crack pipe is working out. I told them you gotta be stoned to work for ......

It made their day!

Yes, what I miss about being retired is the water cooler type sharing. With some schedulers that stuff goes over great. With others if you mentioned you gotta be stoned to work for ___ my guess is that they would terminate you in a heartbeat as being a self-admitted addict.

I signed up before they had the security question, but never did any shops for them. I cannot log in. When they have called me to do shops, I always tell them this, and I always get a promise to fix it (they aparently know this happens to people like me, who have the same situation...but IT has to fix it.) It has never been fixed. Been months. Not holding my breath.

I like shopping with them, and find their site easy to get around in. Scheduling, reports, communication and payment have been problem free. Wish they had had more here.

They called me today with 16 shops and actually asked if I was feeling ok since I didn't self-assign these from the board. Three different schedulers in an hour, we had some laughs, I said ok to the projects and they'll get things in motion from their end

I've worked for Maritz going on my third year now. I didn't much like their shops when I first began because I thought they didn't explain exactly what they were looking for (these are gas station MS/audits) but I muddled through a couple of them and was paid, no questions asked. Last year in the fall they were wrapping up their quarterly MS/audits with a different client and, since I had done several of these earlier and had gotten use to them, they called me to see if I was interested in doing a road trip from my home in Bismarck ND down into western Minnesota to pick up some of these shops. At the time they were offering $13 per shop and they asked me how much I would need to do some of these shops. I did some figuring and told them I would do about 20 of them over a 2 day period for $42 per shop. They then asked me if I was talking about a $42 bonus per shop and I told them no, I meant a total of $42 per shop. They agreed to that and I went out and did the shops. Lo and behold, when they paid me, they paid the $13 per shop and bonused them at $42 so I got a total of $55 per shop. This happened just before Christmas last year so you know how much that helped me out. I have had some problems with them (who hasn't had problems with a company if you work for them long enough) but have always been able to work things out with them. They seem to be eager to work with you about any problems. One of the things I don't like with this company is that when I need to talk to them, I can call on the phone and 99% of the time I end up leaving a voicemail and then it can take them up to 3 days to call me back. However, I have never had a problem with them paying me by check. I DO wish they offered a direct deposit option.