I hope everyone that is owed money is paid. Luckily I never did anywork for them except a few online bank surveys. I have been paid for all of those.

Same here. We need our money and no doubt so do the employees of Grass Roots. Ongoing prayers!

They owe me for three mouse shops, so sixty dollars total. I bought stuff that I can't even return if I wanted to try and recoup my losses.

I was paid for work I did in January in March, but they shorted me about $30. I emailed them in March and was told the missing amount was verified and it would be added to my Visa card by April 2
15th. I checked that entire week and didn't find my missing $30 in my account or in my mailbox so I emailed them and found that the email addresses are no longer working.

I have a situation I haven't seen addressed here yet...I received my first prepaid card before they closed but was unable to retrieve my shopper pin from the website before they deactivated it. Can anyone tell me if our shopper pins correspond to any personal information (phone number, date of birth, etc.) so I can figure out what it is to activate and use the card? The prepaid card company confirmed that the money is still on my card but said that they cannot tell me what the activation code is. Thanks!

Your Visa pin is your shopper ID with however many zeros in front of it to make it eight digits.
I believe I added four zero's to the front of mine.

Grassroots filed for bankruptcy on April 23rd.

See more details here [www.mysteryshopforum.com]

Yes, but I do not know my shopper ID without being able to log onto the website anymore. I was asking if the shopper ID corresponded to any other number that I would automatically know. My user name was my phone number (10 digits - too long). It doesn't appear to be listed in any old emails I received. Any other ideas?

I received a Gift card for the restaurant shop I did in late March. I paid with a gift card so I am assuming that the gift card they sent is good.
Has anyone had a problem using the dessert gift card?

omg!!!!they owed me like $75 from a dinner..........WOW

I did a restaurant shop in March and they owe me $50 in gift cards.

@ItlianDiva wrote:

Yes, but I do not know my shopper ID without being able to log onto the website anymore. I was asking if the shopper ID corresponded to any other number that I would automatically know. My user name was my phone number (10 digits - too long). It doesn't appear to be listed in any old emails I received. Any other ideas?

Depending on your browser, you can look at your stored password list. Did you have auto login set up for the website?

And with what browser?

If it was Firefox, it's real easy to get the shopper ID from the security tab in options.

I'm not worried about the 2 $25. cards. They owe me over $600.00 for an expensive hotel shop! I tried contacting MSPA as you suggested, but did not get anywhere. What else can we do?

OK so how do we do that... they owe me over $600.00 ? I have lots of receipts !

This would not be the first company to "bleed" a subsidiary dry and then file bankruptcy while the company as a whole is doing extremely well. I'm surprised they are not worried about brand damage control to the current customers.

The parent company brags about all the large accounts they have. If only there was a way to shame them publicly for this technical maneuver.

Legally, they know there is not any one debtor to spend the money and attempt to pierce the veil of the subsidiary company without a class action case.

Continued prayers for all involved - for timely payments and for former employees who also face financial hurdles!

So how do we file a "class action" lawsuit...? Can we all at least start a list of all of our names for a start ?

I will join in!

This is a bankruptcy proceeding. Each shopper is an unsecured creditor. Unsecured creditors are far down in the priority list as far as being able to get any proceeds after the company is liquidated. What assets are are they likely to have? Some computers, copiers, file cabinets? They probably rented the office. I fear that the proceeds from selling their assets will barely cover the costs of the bankruptcy administrator. Hopefully, I am wrong. I posted the following on a different thread.

Alas, as a shopper, you are an unsecured creditor (there are different classes of creditors). As an unsercured creditor, you are way down on the priority list when it comes to getting any money from the court after liquidation of the business. Unfortunately, this is not the first time that an MSC has gone bankrupt or disappeared and shoppers have lost money. Any money you actually expended can be claimed as a business expense. My understanding is that fees that you did not collect can not be deducted anywhere (my understanding is that a bad debt requires that you transfer money to the person/company first, and then they don't repay it). If they paid you on a pre-paid card and they took the money back or otherwise made it unavailable, then it might be a bad debt. But anything you can deduct only softens the blow since it is a deduction against revenue and is worth 25% or whatever your marginal tax rate happens to be for Tax Year 2015.

Some of you have felt sorry for their employees who were not getting paid. If they had employees, they are much higher in priority, and in many states, they were required to escrow a month or two of salary. Of course, they might not have done that. It is hard to enforce (no one is watching until it is too late). The Florida Wage and Hour Board (or whatever it is called there, hopefully Florida has seen fit to have one) will fight on their behalf. No one will fight on behalf of mystery shoppers who are independent contractors, and we are individually owed paltry sums compared to the unsecured creditors who will be hiring lawyers to try to get a piece of the liquidation proceeds.

Still, you should each file a claim with court. If you don't you will get nothing. If you do, you might get something. Having the court recognize that you are owed a certain amount as fees may even make them deductible against revenue, but one of the tax cognoscenti (like Dspeakes) will need to offer advice about this.

@scanman1 wrote:

@ItlianDiva wrote:

Yes, but I do not know my shopper ID without being able to log onto the website anymore. I was asking if the shopper ID corresponded to any other number that I would automatically know. My user name was my phone number (10 digits - too long). It doesn't appear to be listed in any old emails I received. Any other ideas?

Depending on your browser, you can look at your stored password list. Did you have auto login set up for the website?

And with what browser?

If it was Firefox, it's real easy to get the shopper ID from the security tab in options.

I used IE to log in. I know my user name and password, but the instructions for activating the card from the email I received state: "Your activation code is your Shopper Pin number (located on the personal information page of your Grass Roots profile, next to your name)." I never paid attention to this number previously, which is why I am not sure what it was or if it was a randomly generated number by Grass Roots or a number that corresponded to any personal info of mine. I believe I did have auto login set up for the website on IE. If there is any way to get my shopper ID from this, please let me know. My thought is that the shopper pin is a different number than the user name since the user name is 10 digits and the shopper pin has to have leading 0's added to it to make it a 9 digit number to activate the card.

They mailed me the gift cards for the restaurant shops that I completed in March but I have not received the $40.00 for the 2 retail shops done also in March. My debit cards still shows that I have the almost $70 that I have not used but I might be surprised when I will try to use it if it will be declined.

Grass root owes me two $20 Cheesecake factory payment. I have not received it. I cannot login to their site for other assignments done.

I am still trying to see what we can do... They owe me over $600.00 can we all get together on this one?
I've tried contacting MSPA to no avail.

Yes they owe me a $50 gift card to Bonefish Grill which was the last shop I performed for them on 3/28/15 prior to them announcing they stopped doing business as of 3/31/15. I hope they pay what they owe and either send me a $50 Bonefish Grill gift card or send me $50. I worked hard to give them a superior mystery shop and I would hope they pay what they owe.

I too have a visa with a lot still on it. I hope I can access the visa and use the money. This really sucks that not only they are not paying for shops performed prior to 3/31/15 when they went out of business but they are stealing the money on individual mystery shoppers pre-paid visa cards. The mystery shoppers need to file a class action suit against grass root mystery shopping company.

I was short changed by Coyle Hospitality, which I believe was part of the Grass Roots America group, on several occasions this year.

Here is what I was paid this year.
On 3/31/15, I received the following payments:
$45.72 for [client name removed] restaurant. This was the full payment I was entitled to.
$100.00 for [client name removed]. This was the full payment I was entitled to.
$115.16 for [client name removed]. I should have received a dinner reimbursement of $92.80 plus a payment of $30 for completeing the report. I was short changed by $7.64. I have not received an explanation from Coyle. My report was accepted with an excellent rating.

On 4/30/15, I received the following payments:
$148.54 for [client name removed] restaurant. I should have received a dinner reimbursement of $150.00 plus a payment of $15.00 for completing the report. I was short changed by $16.46. Not only was I not paid for completing the lengthy report, I was not completely reimbursed for the dinner.
$115.00 for [client name removed]. This was the full payment I was entitled to.

In summary, I have been short changed by $24.10. It has been difficult because I was unemployed at the time. I have never received any explanation of the reason for the small payments.

Mod note: Welcome to the forum Wendyfred. Please do not link the client with the company that shops them. It is one of the rules of this forum and an ICA violation. Thanks.

This is a bankruptcy proceeding. You need to file a claim with the bankruptcy court. That is how it works. The bankruptcy court has appointed a Trustee to liquidate the company and distribute whatever proceeds they get. That is how bankruptcy law works. Claims are made by individuals - each mystery shopper has to file a claim. You are an unsecured creditor.

Here is the link to the thread which contains information about the Chapter 7 filing, which occurred on April 23rd: [www.mysteryshopforum.com] In the same thread, SunnyDays2 reports, "They have $14.5 million in debt." Frankly, I am amazed that they have that much debt. Now, my speculation. How much could they have in assets? Some computers, desks, phones, copiers? Maybe some accounts receivable. Presumably sums owed to mystery shoppers are included in the $14.5 debt.

You need to file a claim with the bankruptcy court.

Wendyfred - Coyle is not part of Grassroots. Why would you reach that conclusion? If you have an issue with Coyle, contact them.

@myst4au --

you might be interested to know that the sums owed to mystery shoppers are NOT included in that debt. However, not shockingly, some of that money is "owed" to other divisions of the Grass Roots Group. The sums owed are mostly liabilities for fulfilling contracts with clients. The biggest client, according to the bankruptcy filing, was Halliburton.

In the filling, they're claiming they owe various divisions of the Grass Roots Group well over one million dollars. Again, with absolutely no mention of mystery shoppers as a liability.

Ironically, the Grass Roots Group recently stated that last year was a "record year." They just opened a new office in Spain, sending out a press release about their expansion. They claim over $500 million a year in revenue. The biggest shareholder of the Grass Roots Group -- 48% owners -- just paid their CEO $66 million last year.

Obviously, there is plenty of money to go around. I've been attempting to contact the Grass Roots Group for an explanation, but they have not responded to my requests.

How is it that they have so much money, but are unable to meet the obligations of one of their divisions? They are leaving very big clients on the hook. They're not paying mystery shoppers for work completed. How are they able to justify this?

Hopefully they will have an answer soon.

They owe me two cheesecake factory gift cards.