We got a raise! Again! Ok, it's just a buck, but it says a lot about a company that is willing to keep bumping up pay rates as costs of living soar. When almost all other MSCs are reducing or even eliminating, fees, Servimer continues to be a first-rate company in my opinion!

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/26/2024 01:08AM by sestrahelena.

Agreed! They are great!

Agreed! Even better, the $1 increase is for basic parking shops (at least in my area). A location that has higher fees got a $3 increase.

They are both highly communicative and appreciative. I should probably do more work with them.

@CoolMusic wrote:

They are both highly communicative and appreciative. I should probably do more work with them.

Too bad they don't have more shops. I agree, they are really great to work with.

They recently got a bunch of new shops, so be sure to check them out. Some are in areas where the had few or none before.

Yes, there are new shops in my area and my scheduler told me more will be coming. Yay!

I really like them. I've done a bunch of shops for them, and anytime there's been an issue (once totally my fault, once a really strange situation completely out of my control, and support during my initial shop for them), they've always been professional and responsive.

So many positive reviews on Servimer. I did one parking shop for them and found it to be so cumbersome and a pita...not at all what I expected from reading everyone's comments. I am hesitant to take any more. It might have just been that location, but I was stuck at a pay machine and not able to reach a live person...yadayadayada..too many questions and complications for the fee in my opinion. I'm sure they must be great for others, but not for me anyway.

MsJudi,
I have literally done many hundreds of shops for them and your experience does, indeed, sound like an unusual problem with the client's equipment. Did you follow up with a call to the Servimer HELP number that comes on every report form so that they could alert the client to the problem?

I just did the report as was noted in the guidelines. It was just very stressful for me and I did not enjoy doing it. I've actually completed this same location many times when a different company did it and the entire process and report so was much simpler. This one was quite a while ago so I'm a bit foggy on the specifics, but I remember worrying that I had damaged the ticket and wouldn't be able to exit the facility if I couldn't reach someone, which I never did. I ended up paying at a machine and what else transpired I don't remember. I just know the report was a bear...at least my experience...it seemed to go on and on. Not at all my cup of tea..But glad they work for you.

There is a phone number that you can call WHILE you are still at the location if something goes wrong. They will help you!

@MsJudi wrote:

I just did the report as was noted in the guidelines. It was just very stressful for me and I did not enjoy doing it. I've actually completed this same location many times when a different company did it and the entire process and report so was much simpler. This one was quite a while ago so I'm a bit foggy on the specifics, but I remember worrying that I had damaged the ticket and wouldn't be able to exit the facility if I couldn't reach someone, which I never did. I ended up paying at a machine and what else transpired I don't remember. I just know the report was a bear...at least my experience...it seemed to go on and on. Not at all my cup of tea..But glad they work for you.

I'm trying to understand the hype. Maybe I can't see everything that is offered? I get emails for parking jobs paying less than $30 a piece. That's a waste of my time. Are there actual high paying jobs if you have done a lot of work for them?

BayShopper,
You can do the shop any day of the month that the facility is open from the first to the 12th of the month, or from the 13th to very near the end of the month for the later month shops. On the day that 99 percent of the next months shops are released, experienced shoppers can sign up for as many shops as they want to handle for the month, knowing that shop fees will not change during the month. If more shops are released by the clients later, again they come at their local fixed fee. You can use a "lost ticket" scenario at just about any location that does not use LPR to identify every vehicle at entry, thus cutting your time on site to as little as 10-15 minutes. The reports are set up so that answers to early-appearing questions will guarantee that only relevant questions follow. You can do as many shops as you like in one day and many shops do 10 or more in dense urban areas. Many of their shoppers take advantage of the ability to dictate the few, short, narratives for each shop while conducting that shop or others during the day. Because of flexibility a to the date that you shop a location, you can use their shops to be close to other MSC shops, get your parking reimbursed and grab other well paid shops within walking distance. (I use this technique to grab well paid shops that go begging because other shoppers cannot afford to park near them. All of their regional manager have done hundreds if not thousands of their shops. And, THEY validate your shops and coach new shoppers to improve their reports. This means that any returned report will come with help to let the shopper understand what needs to be fixed so that they can return an acceptable report. Perhaps by now, you can begin to see why Servimer is voted by shoppers as one of the best MSCs to work with year after year

Walesmaven- thanks for the explanation. That's not my style of shopping, but it is good to keep in mind if I ever need parking in the city.

I have asked for bonuses for their parking shops an hour away from me and they won't budge. But after reading Walesmaven's post I think it might be something I might look into in the near future.

I don't mind sitting waiting for the required time to expire while I'm filling out the report. Perhaps I haven't read their guidelines close enough to understand what they want.

The lost ticket scenario seems like it's the best way to go. $20-25 for a 15 minute shop is very good. But I don't know what LPR is and a google search just turned up a medical procedure.

License plate recognition

It's where your plate is read by cameras on the way in a garage so even if you tell the attendant you lost your ticket they would know when you entered.

The hype for me is when I'm doing a fine dining lunch that includes x amount for parking and I take a valet shop near (or sometimes even at) the location.
Or when my daughter has a dr appointment, so I don't pay for parking.

The narrative is only a couple sentences. It doesn't have to be a book. I've never had a problem submitting something like
'The parking signage was highly visible from the street. As I pulled up to the ticket dispenser I observed a padded gate arm in the down position. The dispenser issued me a ticket with the proper time and date printed on it. The garage was overall well maintained, with some areas of rust and dirt but nothing excessive."
And then the exit narrative just simply stating what happened when you offered the attendant cash payment, or created a problem of some sort. It's not a Coyle dinner report.

@wrosie wrote:

I have asked for bonuses for their parking shops an hour away from me and they won't budge. But after reading Walesmaven's post I think it might be something I might look into in the near future.

I don't mind sitting waiting for the required time to expire while I'm filling out the report. Perhaps I haven't read their guidelines close enough to understand what they want.

The lost ticket scenario seems like it's the best way to go. $20-25 for a 15 minute shop is very good. But I don't know what LPR is and a google search just turned up a medical procedure.

Thanks Viv, it explains a lot and sounds a lot less involved than the scheduler I emailed made it out to be.

I've done a lot of valet shops and a couple garage shops, but the guidelines and scheduler made their shops seem more involved.

You've been a big help.

There are some random special shops, those might have a wonky scenario.... but for the most part they are just looking for you to try and pay a live human being in cash.
Once you do a few it is really simple, and there might be quite a few yes/ no questions but after may a few shops these things become second nature to look for and don't take any extra time.

@wrosie wrote:

Thanks Viv, it explains a lot and sounds a lot less involved than the scheduler I emailed made it out to be.

I've done a lot of valet shops and a couple garage shops, but the guidelines and scheduler made their shops seem more involved.

You've been a big help.

I've done a few weird ones for them. They have garages near Capital One Arena in DC so there are event shops that are...odd at times. Plus a "leave after 11pm and lose your ticket" one. odd, but not hard to do. Their reports are generally pretty simple. The only big thing is making sure to refuse a receipt if you can pay someone in cash.

viv0412,
You will be smiling when you hear that several sentences of your model entry narrative are actually not needed unless there was a problem with those items/function. Try this: "The ticket dispenser and gate operated as designed. All signage was professional and easy to read. The garage was well maintains, with just a few areas of rust or aging paint."

As stated above, they don’t have the highest (or lowest) fees and they almost never bonus but if you need the parking they’re a fabulous company to work with. They also do video shops with higher fees and explicitly allow you to use their equipment for non-Servimer shops. Those shops are not listed on the board. And their airport parking shuttle shops are a godsend if you need airport parking.

I hope it's OK to interject briefly and just say that I'm loving this conversation! If you have any questions about Servimer or how our shops work, feel free to ask here or to PM me. Also, if you have any suggestions for how to clarify our shop instructions or how to simplify our reporting templates, we'd love to hear from you. Thanks for the great posts!

@NinS wrote:

And their airport parking shuttle shops are a godsend if you need airport parking.

I’m guessing that none of the airports near me are included?

SFO, OAK, SJC, SMF

Bay, you never know. It seems that Servimer has been getting quite a few new-to-them shops rolling in recently. So you could PM Scott to see.

All the servimer shops vanished at once off of gigspot around mid-May. I haven't seen them since, even though there's usually about 5 different locations that show up for me.

@mysterioso412 wrote:

All the servimer shops vanished at once off of gigspot around mid-May. I haven't seen them since, even though there's usually about 5 different locations that show up for me.

So....go to their website.

@weatherman2111 wrote:

@mysterioso412 wrote:

All the servimer shops vanished at once off of gigspot around mid-May. I haven't seen them since, even though there's usually about 5 different locations that show up for me.

So....go to their website.

If you’re signed up on gigspot whenever you go to a company’s website (that also uses gig spot), it sends you right back to giigspot. You can’t actually get to servimer’s site - I already tried that in case they were no longer using gigspot.

Many shoppers who tried Gigspot quit using it for exactly that reason.

@BayShopper22
We do shop the parking at SMF. It's a popular shop, but let me know off-thread if I can help reserve something for you. Note that near OAK we have a bunch of nice hotel valet shops and even a very pleasant weekly hospital valet shop, and it's one of the few where the client also reimburses for a small purchase in the cafeteria. Free wifi and a coffee and pastry while filling out the first half of your report and catching up on email can be pretty sweet! We also shop the parking for every homestand for your MLB team, but I think we have the entire season scheduled. I can let you know if something opens up.

For anyone interested in the airport parking shops, note that it does vary from location to location as to how much our clients are willing to reimburse for actual flights. Every location will pay at least one full day, but some cap it at that. Others reimburse several days or up to a certain $$ amount.