Company Overview: I hesitate to mention this company because it will sound too good to be true, and some might accuse me of adding “recreational products” to my martini. Based in New Jersey, Taylor and Associates specializes in Pay Per View (PPV) compliance. In other words, you’ll be assigned a location thats advertising something they haven’t paid for the right to show.
The Good: High pay. If all you do is successfully complete the required affidavit, you’ve just earned $150.00. Video shoppers go ahead and break a nail and robe and wire…there’s another $50.00. Lastly, return to the location the next day and get pictures of the front and the roof with the satellite dishes and you’ve earned yet more money.
The Bad: There’s really only one negative to this—you need to be flexible because you won’t know until an hour or so before the event if the target needs to be shopped. Another downside is the intervals between shops. Although you won’t be going back to a location you’ve shopped, there can still be gaps of 3-4 months between shops.
Personal Experience: On my first shop, I spent just over an hour at the location. With experience, you could reduce the time to 15-20 minutes, potentially doing two or three locations in one evening, assuming they are available, and close enough together. You’re a mystery shopper, you can do the math. The hardest part for me was the affidavit, not because of the writing, but because of the formatting. Now that I have a template, the assignments go much faster.
Pay: Here’s where it gets good. If you shoot a video, you will be paid upon receipt of the package. If you don’t submit a video, then the turnaround for payment is five to six weeks. I did an assignment on Saturday night, with video, and the money was in my PayPal account on Thursday. A two hundred plus dollar assignment and I was paid in less than a week, and the total invested time was under three hours. There is a trade-off. The higher pay does mean a higher quality of work is expected. Although Taylor and Associates does not offer video file transfers, since the affidavit needs to be mailed, I burn the video to a DVD and send it, along with a CD of the exterior pictures and the affidavit in a USPS Priority Flat Rate envelope.
Communications: When you email with a question, you’ll get an answer, usually the same day.
Signing Up: Assuming you’ve stuck with me, and are convinced that I’m not having strange delusions, signing up is easy. Just send an email to taylornassoc@hotmail.com. Include your name, email address, location, and phone number. Robert Taylor will give you a call and give you more of the details.
What Others Say: There are no discussions onwww.mysteryshopforum.con about this company. There was a thread last year where the company was briefly mentioned and I signed up. It’s something I haven’t regretted.
What most impressed me about Taylor and Associates occurred on my third and most recent shop for them. I get the call and go to the location, stayed about an hour getting good video, then went back the next day to shoot the exterior pictures and satellite dish. I start to work on the affidavit and I get a call from Mr. Taylor. He’s all apologetic, but the location that I was sent to wasn’t supposed to be shopped. I told him that I had just returned from a second trip there to get the exterior photos. Long story short, I received a very nice fee for my troubles, and it wasn’t a struggle to get paid for it. This MSC believes in doing the right thing.