Does anyone think that "mystery shoppers" can be unfair or biased?

Question

and that they don't always take the situation into consideration? The have a list of things to answer yes or no with no room for circumstances. We got a very low grade on our last one and the boss is furious at us. It was a day that we were very busy for a while and shorthanded. On top of that the boss had put a note on the board for everyone who hadn't completed their comuter courses to complete them or they would not be on next weeks schedule . Two of the employees were busy doing these courses that can only be done during their scheduled work hours and as a result the mystery shopper didn't get waiting on in the amount of time in their department. These employees can only do one thing at once. They seem to get in trouble for just doing what they are supposed to. And the checkouts were backed up but we only had 2 people and one was brand new. Nothing is perfect all the time sp why would a sales person be? We get points off for not staring the person in the eye too. creepy

I try very hard to do and say everything I am supposed to each customer but if I have 4 customers at one time and I am supposed to wait on all of them at the same time (confusing) I can't give each of them 100%. I am also expected to walk away from a customer that I am placing an order for and run to the register and ring up people nonstop. If I don't do this and one of the customers is the mystery shopper, I get in trouble, whereas if the person that I am ordering for is the mystery shopper, I get in trouble for walking away in the middle. How is anyone supposed to figure out which to do?

in response to ordinary guy on the contrary, our manager has cut everyone's hours this week. There would have normally beed 2 employees working all day in computers, but this week they had 1 and the other only worked 4 hours and spent half the time trying to catch up on training and more time helping a customer who had stopped at the front of the store with a machine that they had put the wrong cartridge in and that they expected us to work a miracle to fix it now that it was messed up. On top of that they had purchased it at another of our stores.

Answer 1

I don't see why the staff should be blamed, especially those actually working with customers. It should be a blessing in disguise: the answer should be to hire more people.

Answer 2

I agree, they can be unfair and biased. I work in a hotel where we get "test calls" to make sure that we are taking reservations a certain way. One of things we are supposed to do if they balk at the rate is offer a lower rate, but if we only have 1 room left on a busy weekend, why should we offer a lower rate when we know we can sell it for full price? We're also supposed to sell amenities and recap our reservations a certain way, but sometimes the caller will sound like they're in a hurry, or don't really want to be on the phone with you (which they probably don't, it is work for them after all), so some of our clerks will rush through the reservation and then get in trouble for it.