I think I screwed up a secret shop

[Dark Psion]

OK, here's the current situation;

Our last "official" paint department employee quit three months ago.
Currently there are three of us who can mix paint, but none of us are "officially" in the paint department.
It is spring and I am back out in the Greenhouse.
Thursday and Friday are my main plant delivery days.

Guess which days they have given the other two paint people as days off?

So, my Thursdays have been back and forth, unload plants, mix paint, try to help a plant customer but then they not only interupt us but insist that I leave my 10-20 customers in the greenhouse to go wait on 1 customer in paint.
(I am just waiting for one to go balistic on me for leaving them)

OK, so it is my umpteth interurption today and this time it is a lady who is asking suspicious questions. What is the warrenty on the polyurathane floor paint? Do we have a paint for stucco?
She's all over the paint field but not actualy buying anythng. I'm thinking mystery shopper.

I'm also thinking, I don't care.
I am tired, sore, sweaty and just plain worn out. I tell her "I don't know" which is true about the floor paint as it is the only one without a warrenty on the label, but is not true about the stucco paint. True Value makes it, but we don't carry it as it is a waste of shelf space. Why have a paint for one surface that costs twice as much as a paint for multliple surfaces?
(BTW, there is a new paint coming on the market that needs no primer, doesn't stink and dries in an hour. Oh and it will cost betwen $55 and $100 a gallon)

So afterward I am thinking she was probably a mystey shopper and the bosses will raise a big stink about it at a store meeting, especially since Boss#1 got 100% on the last one. But then again, I am the only one who knows how to access the mystery shopper reports
Heh heh

[Alfie]

So she didn't buy anything? For our store, they have to buy something, so that they get the whole experience, so I would doubt it if she was a secret shopper. Would it be the same for your store?

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

So she didn't buy anything? For our store, they have to buy something, so that they get the whole experience, so I would doubt it if she was a secret shopper.

I would too. Our secret shoppers are supposed to grade the cashiers as well as the sales floor people, and that requires them to buy something.

[sarahj]

We get two secret shoppers a month. Basically they're the two people who eat alone, and ask for a receipt.

I think I got one last weekend, and we get marked down if the service time is over one minute, but it would have been under if the kitchen staff that day would hurry the f**k up! I never NEVER swear. Maybe a "damn" on occasion. Just the way I was raised. But I could have sworn up a storm at these guys! I'd ask them to make a burger, and they'd go, "what?" And then "maybe." I say "maybe," in response to a request sometimes, but I ALWAYS do the requested action. These guys were slow on purpose!

Anyway, there's no way I'm gonna take any kind of "talking-to" if it was a secret shopper. And neither should Dark Psion. My store needs to have at least a few decent people in the kitchen, the hardware store needs to have at least one or two people assigned to each department.

[Strikesfirmly]

Probably like most retail stores we get far too many customers all day, every day in store or on the phone who want to know every little detail about what they might want to buy without ever actually buying anything. And of course they all demand we drop everything and wait solely on them until demons can ice skate.

Which I understand, planning is important, it just can't be hours of discussion. But when I have talked to you on several occasions about the exact same things, which are most likely all printed on the label or brochure... And told you umpteen times ~I~ cannot authorize discounts, which even the manager is unlikely to give you...

Die, just die dammit. Or better yet, leave. Forever.

The mystery shopper thing is such BS. But typically bosses are hung up on the trivial and unrealistic. Somehow I doubt most bosses would come off well if they had to wait on a mystery shopper - ours was a cashier, she didn't work the floor or mix paint etc.

Of course our current main cashier, who has worked there for seven (7) years, can't always remember the difference between CPVC and PVC.

[Demonoid Phenomenon]

Mystery shopping is such a snarky job.
I don't know if I've ever encountered one (though I probably have), but it's just so low.
It seems like it would be way too easy for someone with a chip on their shoulder to get revenge or just be a complete ass because they can.

[Reyneth]

So afterward I am thinking she was probably a mystey shopper and the bosses will raise a big stink about it at a store meeting, especially since Boss#1 got 100% on the last one.

If they even *try* to say anything (if she was a secret shopper), I'd put them right on the spot and tell them that if the store was properly *staffed,* there wouldn't be any issues. They caused the problem, nothing you did. You were never officially trained for that area, and you have another area that you are responsible for - that is asking way too much.

Of course, they'll still try and blame it on you if they can, I'm sure. grrrrrrrr

[felixxkatt]

our secret shoppers must also purchase something.. though they didn't need to actually purchase anything when i worked for a jewelry company in a department store, there they would jsut come and barrage you with questions.

[Sandman]

I actually have mystery shoppping companies actually call me when they need a site done. They know that because I told them I work in retail and I can actually give them an objective view looking at all the senarios that could play out (lack of staffing and the store being absolutely busy, emergency happening in the store) and I actually get perfect ratings on them.