Thursday, November 13, 2008

Another Tweak To Mystery Shopping

I forgot to mention in my post yesterday about another tweak I am making to my mystery shopping gig: I am not going to take any shops where I have to shell out money first. Unless---they are very interesting or well paying, and they hit me at the right time of the month. The problem is for those kind of shops, you may have to buy a product or a service. In some cases, you return the product and the store gives your money back. That is usually not such a problem because you normally get the credits back in a few days. But the other kind of shop is where you have to pay for something and you get reimbursed by the mystery shopping company. In this type of scenario, it can be 30 days before you are reimbursed. And that can play havoc with a checking account as tight as mine.

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Narrowing My Focus in Mystery Shopping

I am now at the end of my third month of mystery shopping. I have to say overall I like it. What I like is the money and that some of the shops are outside my ordinary routine and pathway. I get to go to other parts of the city and try things that I ordinarily wouldn't try.

Like test driving the sportscar. Now that was fun! It was a little hot roadster, and boy did I look good in it, and was it fun to drive! I have enjoyed the apartment shops and also the bank shop I did the other day.

But now that I am three months in, it is time to take stock. I am also starting to study for the bar exam again, and I have to be aware of my time. What I am going to do is not take anymore low paying mystery shops, which means no more fast food ones. That is OK, since I don't need fast food anyway. I am not going to repeat some of the time consuming ones, like the dry cleaning one I recently did. Not that it really was so bad, but I had to drive a long way, and they kept not having my clothes ready. So I had to make multiple trips.

Basically, I am going to make $15 the bottom fee that I will accept. And I will only accept that if the shop sounds interesting or is extremely easy. I really don't want to do anything under $20. My bar exam study time won't allow for it.