What are some legit mystery shopper companies?

You won't really earn extra money through mystery shopping -- most shops pay $5-10 for about 3-4 hours of your time and often the gas money you spend traveling to/from the shop is more than you get paid. In addition, you are lucky to get even 1 assignment a month, and for services (meals, haircuts, car wash, etc) you don't get paid anything at all. You just get reimbursed the cost of the service, but have to spend your own money upfront and are reimbursed up to a certain amount 30 days after you submit your evaluation form and receipts. So you might get an assignment to review a local pizza restaurant. You will be told to go with xx number of people and order certain menu items, and will be reimbursed up to a certain amount. This will usually not include your drinks, tip or any extras you have. So they might reimburse you for 2 medium pizzas and 2 side salads but you are paying for anything else. Same with a haircut -- they might reimburse you for a cut at Supercuts but if you want a blow dry you will pay for that yourself To find legitimate mystery shopping companies near you, look on the MSPA website as almost all legitimate mystery shopping companies are MSPA members http://www.mspanorthamerica.com/searchmspa/search.php The only section you need to worry about is the Locations/Region Served by Company where you enter your country and state and it will bring up a list of every company who conducts mystery shops in NY State. Then you will need to contact each company individually to see if they are accepting new shoppers. At any given time, probably 80% will not be accepting new shoppers as in this economy there are many more shoppers than assignments. Most companies are no longer paying for mystery shopping agencies and instead are using their own employees to mystery shop their other locations instead of hiring an agency I have been mystery shopping since 1996 on and off and have never seen it this bad. I used to get emails 1-2 times a week when new assignments were available, but now it's maybe twice a month. And unless you can log in within 2 minutes of receiving the email the assignments are immediately filled. I have not had a single assignment since last May

The scam is so easy to run a baby could do it. They send you a check to go shopping with. You deposit it and take money out of your checking. They ask you to wire some money back - by western union. Then.... that check you deposited bounces, even if you took out money. Then you overdraft your checking account since the bank wants the money back for the bounced check. Are you asking how can a check bounce after the bank says it clears? They will send you a fake cashiers check (could be from out of the country). By law, a bank has to clear a check by a certain period of time. Sometimes these checks bounce weeks, even months later. I worked retail. Mystery shopping was done by the company. Everyone in a while they would give us an extra $25 and tell us to visit another store and then enjoy the rest of the day off. All we had to do is spend the $25 and write a short review. Why would any company hire someone from the outside and onlilne for this? At most, they would contact a temporary employment agency.

You won't really earn extra money through mystery shopping -- most shops pay $5-10 for about 3-4 hours of your time and often the gas money you spend traveling to/from the shop is more than you get paid. In addition, you are lucky to get even 1 assignment a month, and for services (meals, haircuts, car wash, etc) you don't get paid anything at all. You just get reimbursed the cost of the service, but have to spend your own money upfront and are reimbursed up to a certain amount 30 days after you submit your evaluation form and receipts. So you might get an assignment to review a local pizza restaurant. You will be told to go with xx number of people and order certain menu items, and will be reimbursed up to a certain amount. This will usually not include your drinks, tip or any extras you have. So they might reimburse you for 2 medium pizzas and 2 side salads but you are paying for anything else. Same with a haircut -- they might reimburse you for a cut at Supercuts but if you want a blow dry you will pay for that yourself To find legitimate mystery shopping companies near you, look on the MSPA website as almost all legitimate mystery shopping companies are MSPA members http://www.mspanorthamerica.com/searchmspa/search.php The only section you need to worry about is the Locations/Region Served by Company where you enter your country and state and it will bring up a list of every company who conducts mystery shops in NY State. Then you will need to contact each company individually to see if they are accepting new shoppers. At any given time, probably 80% will not be accepting new shoppers as in this economy there are many more shoppers than assignments. Most companies are no longer paying for mystery shopping agencies and instead are using their own employees to mystery shop their other locations instead of hiring an agency I have been mystery shopping since 1996 on and off and have never seen it this bad. I used to get emails 1-2 times a week when new assignments were available, but now it's maybe twice a month. And unless you can log in within 2 minutes of receiving the email the assignments are immediately filled. I have not had a single assignment since last May

The scam is so easy to run a baby could do it. They send you a check to go shopping with. You deposit it and take money out of your checking. They ask you to wire some money back - by western union. Then.... that check you deposited bounces, even if you took out money. Then you overdraft your checking account since the bank wants the money back for the bounced check. Are you asking how can a check bounce after the bank says it clears? They will send you a fake cashiers check (could be from out of the country). By law, a bank has to clear a check by a certain period of time. Sometimes these checks bounce weeks, even months later. I worked retail. Mystery shopping was done by the company. Everyone in a while they would give us an extra $25 and tell us to visit another store and then enjoy the rest of the day off. All we had to do is spend the $25 and write a short review. Why would any company hire someone from the outside and onlilne for this? At most, they would contact a temporary employment agency.

Retailers generally hire their own mystery shoppers or use a legitimate known. The websites are regarded as a scam because it seems impossible to actually find a retailer who has even heard of the website claiming to offer these positions