ARE REIMBURSEMENT ONLY MYSTERY SHOPS WORTH THE INVESTMENT?

There has been a trend lately that more and more of the mystery shops are strictly reimbursement only. For those of you that don’t mystery shop yet this means you spend your time, fuel and yes money to go do a shop for a company. So how can this earn you money? It’s not going to pay your bills. So where’s the incentive.

Quite frankly it depends on the shop and you. A shop that requires you to make a special trip to do it and nets you only a hamburger meal is not going to be a money maker for you. However if you are in the area any way and need lunch or dinner then it’s a lunch or dinner you do not have to pack from your food stuffs at home.

Where you come out ahead on such shops are the bigger reimbursement shops. If you say truly NEED a pair of shoes, then a shoe shop that reimburses you $30 for a required purchase for a pair of shoes then you are $30 ahead. If you don’t need the shoes then it’s not a good deal. Despite what some may tell you, or you may think you cannot return the purchase for the cash back if the rules say you can’t. You will get caught returning them and you will lose your mystery shopping opportunities for that and maybe other companies.

For my family the better reimbursement only shops are the larger reimbursement dinner shops. Take the $70 reimbursement only dinner for two at a local restaurant my husband and I recently did. The meal was to include a minimum of one alcoholic beverage at the bar, either an appetizer or dessert, two different entrees, two additional beverages (no water) and tips up to 15% for both the bartender and the server.

Here’s what we had: my husband had a beer at the bar and I had a Pepsi. At this particular restaurant the designated driver gets soda pop for free. So our tab there showed the Pepsi as complimentary, but it did show I drank the soda pop so I had made my requirements in that section. We left the bartender a 15% tip.

For the appetizer we purchased chips, queso and salsa along with one ice tea and one Pepsi. This was a bottomless appetizer and we ate all we wanted until our meals came. When the meal arrived the server automatically refilled our appetizer completely, as well as our beverages.

My husband purchased a full rack of ribs with sides for his meal and I had ½ chicken and ½ rack ribs with sides. This was a tremendous amount of food. We knew we could not possibly eat that much food, but we had chosen meals we both like that when the tip was added in would come to almost exactly the remaining amount of the $70 we would be reimbursed.

We each ate our fill, eating all of the vegetables and little of the meat, then requested to go boxes for everything left on the table that we had purchased. That was a full order of the appetizer, nearly a rack of ribs and 99% of the chicken, plus our salads (we had ordered the dressing on the side), as well as the bones from the ribs we had eaten.

This we took home for future meals. From these leftovers I made the following meals for three:

1. Ribs, combined with macaroni and cheese and veggies.

2. Chicken salad sandwiches

3. Chicken and dumplings (twice so 3 x 2)

4. Taco salad

5. The salad items that had wilted went to feed our poultry.

6. The bones went to our dogs for a treat over a period of four days.

7. I used the single drumstick and wing for a lunch for just me one day.

8. The bones of the chicken were boiled after I deboned them to make broth.

9. After the chicken bones were boiled they were put in the maggot bucket to help feed the birds in the future.

So for that $70 investment I used the ingredients to combine with foods we had on hand to feed 18 meals to the humans (or an average of little less than $4 each for main meat meals) and three different treats for my animals. Plus left tips for two people working hard to pay their bills as well. Plus it was all reimbursed. So all of the above was eventually free.

Considering this shop was across the street from one that I was not out any extra fuel to go do it. In our book this shop was worth it. So it’s all in how you handle the reimbursement only shops.

I’ve turned down many such shops because they aren’t worth it. Some might even include a small fee as well in the reimbursement and I still turn them down. An example is a local carry out pizza shop and here is why.

First it pays $4 plus the reimbursement and there are none of this pizza company near my home, so it is generally a drive to do it, $4 will not even begin to cover my fuel costs. Even if it turns out near where I’ll be I will still turn them down because this is what you have to do.

1. Call in the order using a specific dialing system. This is no big deal except you are expected to record EXACTLY what is said and you are recorded while you do the shop. So if you don’t get it exact the company can refuse to pay you. I mean verbatim. Often the person on the other end of the phone speaks so fast or soft you cannot make it out exactly. So there is problem #1.

2. You are to arrive exactly on time. No big deal again, unless you get hung up in traffic. Be late, be disqualified. The few times I have done this job I made the call from a parking lot right next to the location to avoid being late.

3. Pick up the pizza exactly on time and remember a series of things exactly, including what is said at the register, again this is recorded and you can be disqualified. Not a problem, if you can listen that closely while also looking around for a series of other items you are suppose to check on in the less than five minutes you are in the pickup area.

4. Now for the fun part. As soon as you are out of sight of the pick-up area you are to stop and take photos of the pizza. The photos must be done exactly as the instructions show (they have photos to help you do it right) or you will be disqualified.

5. Then you let it cool 15 minutes—yep you don’t even get to eat the pizza hot. More photos, same rules.

6. Then you have to cut up the slices and take more photos. You must use a specific cutter that you must purchase to do this as well. You are NOT reimbursed for the cutter, but you can use it for more than one shop.

7. So now after you have photographed this more than a super model, handled it, butchered it and played with it you can eat it. If you still find it appetizing.

We seldom if ever do this shop. Especially since it is one of pizza places that is not one of our favorites and one family member doesn’t like his food handled in such a manner. The rules for their delivery are the same, only it arrives even colder and you have to tip the delivery person—hey they are working hard for a living they deserve a tip!

The company that hires you to do this job wonders why they have trouble getting them done each month. When asked I tell them it’s because the pay is too low for what is required. The few times I have done this job it has been with a bonus pay out because the company has needed it done and done NOW.

So as I said earlier it depends on the job and you. If you love that particular pizza brand, don’t mind it has to be cut and handled a lot, then reheated. This job would be fine, especially if you live next door to it.

You might not want to mess with meal leftovers the way I did on the sit down meal, so the $70 layout wouldn’t be for you. Don’t need a pair sneakers, then don’t do the shoe shop. It’s all in evaluating what all is involved.

Another BIG thing to consider is some of the companies take up to 90 days to send your reimbursement check. Can you afford to wait for that $70 to come back in 90 days? What if you don’t get the bartender’s name, or do the write up properly. Can you afford to be completely out the $70? There is much to be considered.

Jan who prefers straight up mystery shops and merchandising in OK

ORGANIZING COMPUTER FILES AND OTHER ASPECTS OF LIFE

How to make a maggot bucket instructions included

August 18, 2009

It seems like when you least have money is when things start breaking down. My computer, you know the thing essential to doing my job, is dying. I'm still working with it today, but the ports are all IFFY, sometimes things plugged into them work, sometimes they don't.

I never know when I click enter if the computer will go out for vacation without me or simply take a coffee break. Either way it could take anywhere from a split second to 15 minutes for the next page to load.

I type very fast, and half the time I'm two paragraphs ahead of the computer monitor right now. So despite not wanting to we purchased me a new computer last night. Which in itself lead to more purchases because it is Vista, soon to be Windows 7 and well all my programs are circa 1995 or earlier–read won't work on the new system.

So as I type on the old faithful worn out laptop Gary is tweaking the new one and adding the also newly purchased programs, along with the newer of my old programs from the old computer that he thinks will work. Once he's done that it will be copy and transfer time. That is always "fun"-not, as you well know.

While looking over everything that needs backed up and transferred I realized my computer files are a disaster! Seriously, I'm months behind on my Quicken, and it at best has devolved into a mere electronic checkbook register. My spreadsheets are so far behind they are almost non-existent. If I had to file my taxes this minute I'd not be able to tell you truly what business expense was made when. My genealogy files are a mess. Photos, scans, and other electronic items are in the wrong files. I still have folders from three email providers ago. I couldn't get hacked because a hacker would come in and say "Forget it, her files have already been hit and garbaged."

Only this goes so against my nature. It's got to change. New computer, new programs, time to get organized. So be prepared to listen to me ramble on over the next several months about what I have found I can and can't do with the different programs and the electronic organizing part of my Princess Plan!

Oh that's right, a lot of you don't know what the Princess Plan is. It's something I started the first of the year. I decided at the end of last year our finances, clutter and all around lack of organization was causing us to live like paupers. So I've been evolving a plan to get organized in every aspect of our lives. Once I've accomplished the whole plan we will be living debt and clutter free as Royalty, or I will become the Princess my Papa always called me.

I was making great progress on the plan until the big "retirement" but I am slowly making my way back to where I was when I got the stunning blow of it. My house is...how do I put it...a mess right now. My computer files I've already described, and well our finances are not in the huge snowball I had planned for now, but we are still current on all the bills. Time to get back to the Princess Plan full force.

While I'm home I can do a lot on the house, but when traveling that's another thing. However, this big plan to clean up computer files will work well both home and away. So I start today. First things first.–those email files.

I can be cleaning those up while Gary works on the new computer and then there will be far less for him to transfer. Then when he needs to work on both computers at once I'll attack the house and laundry. At least the computer waited until we were home and had a little time before trying to go on permanent vacation on me.

The kitchen is my big center of attack today. It's basically tidy, but the fridge and other aspects could handle some TLC. That brings me to today's helpful hints.

I use basic cleaners for the most part. Baking Soda, white vinegar, and bleach. I also use Dr. Bonner's Eucalyptus Castile Soap. You've heard of the first three over and over as natural cleaners I am certain, but you may be wondering about the last one.

It can be purchased at natural food stores and is highly concentrated. You can use it for everything from brushing your teeth to scrubbing your floors. I use it mainly on my counter tops. It's highly concentrated, so a bottle of it will last you a very long time. I spray and wipe my counter tops with it because the eucalyptus helps keep fruit and other flies off your counters.

We always have fruit, sour dough starter and other "fruit fly magnets" around, not to mention I live in the country so flies appear out of nowhere and the eucalyptus helps prevent them. I may live in the country, but I don't tolerate bugs in my home. Nasty!

I'm starting with the fridge in there today. Science experiments will go to the maggot bucket. I've mentioned this item a few times before. I've been promising to tell more about it, so I guess now would be a good as time as any.

Any lidded bucket with a handle will do. Our current one is a detergent bucket. Near the bottom of the bucket Gary drilled about eight 1/4" holes, maybe a little larger. At the top of the bucket he put a few larger holes. Into the bucket we put anything not fit for human or animal consumption. This includes animals the dogs kill, birds that die of natural causes, chicken bones etc. The lid is latched on and then the bucket is suspended from a low tree branch near the bird night pen.

We suspend it because I have dogs I don't want to get in to it. Within just a few days the flies have located the rotting food stuffs, crawl in the upper holes and start to lay their eggs in it. These soon hatch into larvae, also known as maggots, who crawl out the lower holes to fall to the ground to my waiting birds. The adult flies generally die in the bucket making more maggot food.

It's gross I know, but the birds get a free source of natural protein they adore, the world fly population is cut down because those larvae never get to grow up and I am truly recycling otherwise inedible food stuffs. It's a win, win situation.

Anyway, back to cleaning and organizing. Most people spring clean. I tend to be a fall and winter cleaner. I love the fall and therefore want my house wide open, fresh and clean that time of year. Fall is not that far off, so today I start.

First the fridge. It will be emptied and wiped down with baking soda and warm water. What doesn't go to the maggot bucket or to our animals will be put back in an orderly fashion.

Then on to cleaning the outside of it. First the vacuuming of the coils and vent area. This part is important to extend the life of your appliance. I have four indoor cats, do you have any idea how much fur that is. The fur will block the air flow and make your fridge work harder, which puts more heat out into your kitchen, which in turn makes your air conditioner worker harder and the power company sings your praises. So clean the coils folks.

The outside of the fridge will get a good spraying and cleaning with a Dr. Bonner 10 (water) to 1(soap) ratio spray because I purchased bananas yesterday and I KNOW there will be fruit flies if I don't head it off now.

Then on to the glass top stove, where a box knife and baking soda will do the trick. Once all the cabinet tops are done and the sinks scrubbed with baking soda it will be Dr. Bonner's to mop with and a the whole house will smell of eucalyptus for the rest of the day. This, as Martha would say, is "a good thing."

So that's the plan for today, we'll how it goes.

Jan who really didn't want to purchase a new computer, but knew it was time in OK