Mystery (Wo)man

I think it's pretty well know I have done some odd jobs in my life so far. My first job after graduating college was as a paper delivery person. Then there was the summer I worked mainly off of Craigslist as a fun experiment. One of my random jobs now has been pretty well known to me before, but in a completely different context.

I'm now a mystery shopper.

Now, it's not a full time gig and I am making my own rule to never shop in a place where I personally know the employees. That's just too much of a conflict of interest for me.

I use to work at the Maine Mall and we dreaded secret shoppers. We knew when they'd be coming and had to make sure every thing was perfectly in order. If you've ever worked at the mall during the holiday season, you know this is as easy as herding cats in a hurricane. Without fail, these secret shoppers would always come in when we were understaffed and filled with people only to complain how busy our store was.

So I went to my secret shopping adventure with an open mind and lots of random facts memorized. It's not that I have unusually high expectations of customer service, but I have bare minimums of how I feel customers should be treated.

Fact: The customer is not always right. Sometimes the customer is misinformed, stubborn, rude, and wants to take their bad day out on anonymous underpaid employees they will never see again.

Fact: Shopping in stores is a necessary evil at times and should not be as bad as having a root canal without Novocaine. Employees can help make this process easier.

Fact: Manners take very little effort and sometimes a smile to a stranger can change their entire day. Some of my favorite experiences when I worked in customer service were from interacting with really cool people.

Being a mystery shopper is not the best or strangest thing in the world. It's just a system to check in on stores and make sure people are doing their jobs. It's not going to change my life, but having worked in customer service for years I think I may have a different perspective on things.

Wow, I have a different perspective on things. Who would have guessed?