It Was Nice To See Things From The Other Side.

 Many years ago, at the job that I still work at now, there was a few of us in the same invisible group, it wasn’t known to all, but through conversations when we worked in twos, and one day Andy found out I was in the same group as him, the skint group. The individuals that I worked with over the years, we knew who we were, they would openly tell me, “It’s because I go clubbing every weekend,” Or, “It’s because I gamble,” Or It’s because I smoke and drink,” Or and this is my personal favourite, “It’s because “I smoke, drink, gamble, and go clubbing every weekend.” Well, I didn’t do any of that, but I was still skint. We were all, and still on minimum wage.

So, Andy said to me many years ago, “Why don’t you become a secret shopper?” I said, “No its not me, it sounds hard,” He said, “I’ve done it for years, its easy and you get paid to do it,” But I was too scared and had no confidence to pull it off. He had given me the information but I did nothing with it.

Many years went by, then another in the skint group said to me, (he smoked, drank and gambled) “Why don’t you become a secret shopper,” I said to Steve, Andy had mentioned it to me years ago, but I don’t think I would be any good at it,” He said, “I’ve done it and my Mum is very good at it, she earns mega bucks!” This time I decided to give it a go, so I said to Steve, “Can you give me the info of the best one, the one that your Mum uses and I will definatly join them.” He said, “I will ask my Mum which one is the best as she works for more than one,” I said, “OK.” Now I felt hopeful and expectant that the time was right and that it would get us out of debt. The next time we worked together, Steve gave me the hand written note from his Mum of the best one that she used.

A few days later, on my laptop at home I typed in the name of the company and did what it said. There was a test I had to do, which I didn’t expect and if I failed, I could not join. Thank goodness, I passed with flying colours. I was in!

So, as with anything I had to find my feet, and started from the beginning, I gave myself a radius of how far I wanted to travel, then I clicked on places I wanted to go and not go, so I didn’t pick gambling, nightclubs etc. as I would be like a fish out of water! I chose eating out, that way I would be killing two birds with one stone, eating out for free and getting paid for it.

At around nine in the morning the places that I had chose to eat out, would appear on my page, when I signed in, some days there would be twenty to choose from, some days there would be three. There was always something every day. When I clicked on it to agree, then it was mine, provided I did it in the time stated. I soon found out that when those jobs came up on my page, it came up on everybody else’s too, so you had to be very quick.

I work, so it was very important to read the terms and conditions of each job, for some would be in the mornings only, some would be in the evenings only, others would be on Fridays only, some would be within three days, if you failed on ANY of their terms and conditions, you didn’t get paid. So, before I agreed to do any job, I had to make sure I wasn’t working, for if you cancelled it wasn’t good on your record. The more jobs you did, the better jobs they offered you, the more they offered you the richer you would become. The only problem was, you had to do the job first, which made sense and then once a month on the date they set they paid you. As we were skint, we couldn’t afford to splash out, we couldn’t afford expensive restaurants like fifty pounds a head, for us as a family of four, as we were too much into debt, so we went to restaurants, that did meal deals like two meals for ten pounds and drinks was included in the price, give or take five pounds. When I did the eating out, for example at such a place, for each job I had to read all of their requirements before I got there, so here is a scenario, I have to arrive at a specific time between, between six and nine in the evening, I have to take a seat, remember my table number, and the names of any Staff who speaks to me, the camera is on me, I am only allowed to describe them as wearing glasses or not and their name tags and male or female. I had to order my meal at the bar and see if the bar was wet and dirty, and I had to remember how long it took for a Staff to acknowledge me, I had to observe how they were with other customers too, were they friendly or ignoring them. I must get a receipt, without it no payment at all. I would be given in the terms and conditions of food to choose from and two list of drinks to also choose from, nothing else outside this list was allowed, unless they said so. I usually had fish n chips, and Paul the same, I would have cappuccino, and Paul would have to have one of their speciality lagers. I had to remember how long it took for the food to arrive at my table. I had to remember their name on their tag if they were not wearing it, I had to remember if they wore glasses or not male or female. I had to remember how long it took them to come and ask me, “Is your meal OK?” Or if no one asked. I had to go to the ladies, and check if they had hot water in the taps, if the dryer worked or if there were hand towels, and the loo looked clean. I had look if the one arm bandit was on or off. In some places I had to take a picture of the meal before I ate any of it, taking pictures was the hardest for me, for back then I wasn’t on Facebook or any social media, so I felt very conscious doing it, and at the end when I had to stand across the street and take a picture of the building, I just wanted the earth to swallow me up!  Paul would reassure me, “Everyone does it and put it on social media,” But it never helped, taking the pictures was the worst part of the job for me. If I went to any restaurant and when I got there was told, “We are not serving any hot food today, the chef is off sick, we have sandwiches,” Then the assignment became a drink only instead, and I would be paid the set amount of a drinks only job, usually that would be around seven pounds.

When an assignment became a drink only, it was hard, for we were hungry and ready to eat, once Paul shouted, “OH NO!” I had to be very carful I didn’t blow my cover, so that evening we went to the chippy and at home I said to Paul, “Please do not shout out like that again, we will have our drink, and leave as quickly as possible,” He said, “I was starving,” I said, “I know, but try and keep calm, for usually we have a lovely meal out, where before we didn’t as often.” He didn’t do it again.

Some jobs were drink only. The Stella Artois was when Paul came into play. I don’t drink but he does. I would tell him what I had to do before we left the house. With the Stella, it had to be Stella only, it had to be in a Stella glass and the bartender HAD to use the Stella knife to remove the head and put it back in the Stella cup and hand the Stella glass to Paul with the words Stella facing Paul, with a smile! I had to remember the name of the bar person. Paul would tell me, if it was ice cold or not, but he always said, “I like it with the head,” I would reply, “I know, but it has to be this way.”

I went to a few garden centres, on my own, they were always lunch times between eleven and one, I loved the food there, beautiful fish n chips. I had to check if the Staff had name tags on, if they had necklaces on, if tables were cleared away after a customer had gone and how long were they left and not collected. A pudding wasn’t included, but I had to go up to the chalk board and look what the dish of the day was and I had to ask when I was placing my order, “Is there a pudding here that is handmade?” What? No one asks that, but I had to remember what their reply was for later on. Some places didn’t allow makeup or rings, wedding bands only was allowed, I had to name and shame them, I didn’t like that bit. I remember the last garden centre lunch I went to, everything seemed to be going very well, till one of the Staff came over to where I was sitting, and asked me, with her three colleagues looking straight at me and asked me, “Is your meal OK?” I knew I was rumbled, for they had not asked anyone else that question.   

I remember I went to a pub and had to have a meal there, as we walked in, I nearly died! It was December and freezing, it was bitter cold in there, I asked, “Can I see the menu?” Only to be told, “We don’t serve food here,” So then I asked, “Can I have a cup of tea?” The reply came back, “We don’t serve hot drinks,” I then asked, “Can I have a can of pop?” The barman who was a lovely, friendly chap said, “We don’t have any, we only have lager,” Paul had that. The only customer all the short time we were there, was an old man sitting at the bar! I knew I would never go back there. The other thing I didn’t really like about been a secret shopper was the amount of notes you had to type up that night, but before I talk about that I will mention that I did go back to that pub.  

About once a month with work in the van I would drive past that horrible pub, where every seat was ripped and the walls bleak, in my report that night I gave it nought out of ten, for we had to mark every job and state if I would go back or not and why. I drove past many times without looking at it, and it often came up on my page, I ignored it for a year, then one day as I was driving past, it was like the building had been removed and thrown in a skip and a five-star building landed in its place!

The following morning it came up again on my page and I decided to try it out. I’m SO glad we did; it was like the Ritz! I’ve never known such a transformation; it seems like the little nasty pub with no soul, I assume the building was razed to the ground and a phoenix emerged. Inside we couldn’t stop talking about the building before and the new one now. Hence it was given ten out of ten.

The best place we ever ate out was in the Town centre, I had walked past this restaurant hundreds of times, it was two days after Christmas, we were dressed up smart and I am glad we did. We were treated like King, Queen and Meghan like a Princess. The building was beautiful, the service was second to none, the smoking shelter outside was like the most expensive white and glass greenhouse I’ve ever seen, the ladies was exquisite, the food was outstanding!! It was a little bit dearer than we were used to, but it still wasn’t over the top, everything including drinks came to thirty pounds for us three. When we entered there was no other customers, just us, then a man arrived he only had a drink and that was it. It was a shame. I went home and gave it twenty out of ten, for years we talked about it. Sadly, later it closed down, because all of the restaurants, of which there were many, was the other side of Town.

I remember after I had joined as a secret shopper a month later, when I went onto my page, I saw an arrow far outside of my zone of where I wanted to work, it was in London, at a posh hotel for two days and nights, I read their terms and conditions and the amount I would have to pay first would be a minimum of five hundred pounds! I rang the company up and told them, “I don’t have five hundred pounds,” The Staff told me, “This is a really nice job and we thought we would offer it to you,” I thanked her, and thought, that’s life, for I would have gotten all the money back to the value of five hundred pounds, including the train fares, there and back. When I saw Steve, I told him about it, he said, “My Mum is a ‘veteran’ in the secret shopper world and she has been doing it for years, it has made her rich, and she does cruises that pay her thousands of pounds she is there from seven to fourteen days!” I thought, WOW!

The main thing I didn’t like about secret shopping was the amount of notes I had to type when I came home.

I would start with good intentions, the notes could not be skipped, all questions had to be answered, in order that it came, one part was five hundred words had to be typed, nine times out of ten I ALWAYS fell asleep!!!! I would do my best not to, but me sleeping would prolong it, so instead of me doing it in an hour, it would take me two. The notes had to be done that day, for tomorrow was too late, I would not be paid. Some jobs midday the following day was OK, but if I was at work in the morning, then it had to be done that night for I would have Paul and Meghan to help me if there was a problem. The final thing to do was to upload my receipt with my handwritten job number onto the form, it was a welcomed sight to see it appear onto their form, for that was the point of no return, the assignment was completed.  

I loved it as a secret shopper, it gave me an insight into a secret world. In each assignment I had to pick ONE person that I chose that gave ten out of ten, and sometimes it was hard, for some places the ambiance and Staff was fantastic. One place I ate at, I described their male server, “As looking, like he’d just stepped of the cat walk, a very smart looking model. His hair, his clothes, his personality, impeccable.” I added, “He is an asset to the company, hang on to him.” I loved doing that, making someone special, but they didn’t know it.

I gradually stopped doing it about three years ago, due to the huge amount of notes I had to type up at the end, it was just too time consuming. I did ask Steve last year, “Does you Mum still do it?” He said, “No because of Covid.” I would like to start doing it again, next year.

Sometimes when I eat out, I sometimes wonder, who here, is a secret shopper, for they are everywhere, not just in restaurants, I’ve had many a hot and yummy sausage roll from Greggs, can you spot one? A good one, you can’t.