Company Overview: Informa Research Services, Inc.,, is the premier provider of competitive intelligence, sales and service evaluation, regulatory compliance testing, and lead generation services to the financial industry. We gather accurate and timely competitive product information, branch experience measurements, and consumer opinions. We deliver powerful market information, insightful analysis, and targeted recommendations.
Located in Calabasas, CA, a Los Angeles suburb, Informa Research has been in business for over 30 years. They also have an east coast office in Atlanta, GA. Registration is relatively straightforward and starts here: http://www.informars.com/main/Company/BeAMysteryShopper.aspx
Personal Experience: Wow! There are a lot of companies that I will happily work for. If Informa asked me to climb Mount Everest, I’d be on the first flight to Nepal. I admit, I do like most bank shops and the financial services industry is Informa’s forte. But that’s not why I’m wowed by them. What wows me is they have schedulers who help shoppers whenever they can. As an example, a couple of months ago, I got a call from a scheduler asking if I could do five shops for one of their bank clients. I had one day to do them and the route was 570 miles. The scheduler told me up front that they didn’t have the budget to give me the bonus the route really deserved, but they would work with me in the future if I would help them with this route. I left home at 5AM and was back home at 7:30PM. A month later, I was able to create my own route of 20 shops over two days for them. They remembered and that was a wonderful experience.
I know Informa isn’t the only company with schedulers who will help the shoppers who help them but, with the horror stories on Mystery Shop Forum, it’s so nice to see schedulers who will remember.
What Others Have to Say: Discussion on www.mysteryshopforum.com about Informa is generally positive. They pay on time and as advertised. There is one area with some problems and that is in the area of bonuses. Bonuses are paid separately by Informa and shoppers do report some problems with the bonus pay arriving. Most reported that they do eventually receive the bonus payment. Sometimes it takes one call, sometimes multiple calls. I haven’t had a problem receiving bonuses from Informa.
Overall: If you like doing financial service industry shops, then Informa is a must have MSC. Their client list includes most of the top 100 financial service companies in America. I also find, in case I haven’t mentioned it already, that their schedulers are fantastic.