Archived comp shop fail

Status
Not open for further replies.
That's the Target way....doesn't seem logical or make sense but, yeh.
 
awbuckit said:
It's really a stupid system...why give you a list of xxx items and then tell you to only do 75% of it?
Click to expand...

I believe the rationale is that if you're finding everything, you're either shopping the wrong item or making it up. It really is stupid, and I was bright red for a long time until I looked at the metric and sure enough, anything over 70% starts dinging your score.

I've been doing it for about 3 years and I usually get done in one 5 hour shift (which is scheduled...I'm jealous of those of you that can do it whenever!). A lot of the items are the same every week and I know Walmart's sales floor a lot better than ours, sadly. I also don't waste time looking for anything, keeping in mind that 30% is a LOT of stuff not to find. If I don't see it right away, it's an "Item Not Carried".
 
I wasn't able to complete the entire shop this week (scheduling issues) so the former (now acting) PATL went in this morning to finish. Apparently she hadn't been to Wally in a while because she exclaimed "They don't have anything!" We're not going to be green this week, but everyone involved knows the next couple of weeks are going to be transitional.
 
I comp shopped for years. My average was 100 prices an hour. My store only ever budgeted me 6 hours, but told me to spend as many hours as it takes. So 800 items tool me about 8 hours. And yes, NEVER "find" all 800. That counts against you. It's best to stay around 80 percent found.
 
I pulled our store's shop list today. Heavy in electronics and toys. Electronics they will have the stuff, but our Wally has a horrible toy selection and almost none of what is on the list. To get an honest shop in this week I'm going to go for 100% of what I can find and zero out the toy aisles.
 
Ugh, last week was really heavy in electronics. My wally likes to put all random video games on the bottom shelf locked behind glass with no prices, I don't think I've ever used "Price not available" so many times in a given shop. Also, they didn't have most of which was on the list (which isn't usual.)

As far as hours, I feel for you who aren't given the hours, my store is actually good with me giving me hours, they schedule me for 8 but it's however long it takes (usually 8-10 hours) I average about 85/hr. Toys/light bulbs/outdoor lawn and garden are def. my weak spot. I always finish the list, usually with 66-72% found..the rest not carried/not available. Our goal is a final score of 87%, I'm always 92-97%. I usually break it in two 2 trips.

Just wondering though if any of you fellow compshoppers clock in at target? When I trained a year ago for it, I was told to just do a punch correction but now with "My time" my HR said I should be clocking in at the store but my ETL and STL said not to, because of meal compliance and the added time and cost of driving back and forth to clock in for meals and in/out of work. None of my ETLs or TL's know much about compshop, just that it's a piece of percentage that makes up the price accuracy score. I can't really ask anyone for help or advice because they've never done it. I've had to teach myself just about everything..
 
I'm kind of intrigued when I found out about comp shopping. Can anybody give me a brief rundown of how it works? Do you have to announce your visit to the competitor, or is it done in secrecy. Is it hard/complicated? Our GSA does that on certain days, and I was just curious how it works. Do you take a PDA with you and scan barcodes? I saw someone talking about scanning items. I just found it kind of shocking that a competitor would let you walk around scanning items in their store.
 
Last edited:
It's not the typical PDA, it's a little smaller or near the same size as an LPDA, mine doesn't actually scan bar codes though. I have to actually type in the price.

Here's my weekly routine:
Friday (or Sat/Sun) I download the shop onto the device from the Target server
Monday I go to Walmart and knock out a big chunk of the list
later in the week I go a second time and finish the remainder items
Upload shop to target sever (it's due on Fridays)

Walmart pretty much knows that you're from Target, in my experience they are quite friendly and make quick conversation with me as I'm there every week. I know some people have not so pleasant experiences with workers there, but I just try to be respectful and stay out of the way of their working..if they are unloading a pallet I skip over that aisle and come back to it. The list for me is usually 670-930 items long, very vague with little to no direction. Often times it will say something similar to "Barbie Assortment" and Walmart will have 10 different options of barbie assortments, and the dpci number that is on the device doesn't match because it's not the right number. It won't tell you what the price was the last time, but if you are drastically off, it will inform you. A majority of the items seem to be the same or similar on a week to week basis, so once you figure out what they are talking about they become easier with time. It can be stressful in certain departments but for the most part it's okay, just very long. The perks are that you don't have to be at Target, you aren't obligated to talk to anybody, you can wear headphones and aren't hassled by "Additional cashiers to the front lanes" calls every 2 seconds. It makes me just want to do Compshop only and come back to my other work centers once My Time starts scheduling more cashiers.
 
and I agree, they've never challenged me on the length of time or my scores (probably because I raised the score from a 40% to 93%). I think they are just grateful that I have the patience to do it. If they ever challenged me I would probably hand them the device and have them try it for a day. The job goes really under-appreciated, I feel if the TL's or ETL's ever gave it a try they would be amazed that anyone would want to do it.
 
Thank you for sharrin
lisammmk said:
and I agree, they've never challenged me on the length of time or my scores (probably because I raised the score from a 40% to 93%). I think they are just grateful that I have the patience to do it. If they ever challenged me I would probably hand them the device and have them try it for a day. The job goes really under-appreciated, I feel if the TL's or ETL's ever gave it a try they would be amazed that anyone would want to do it.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your information. Sounds challenging but peaceful at the same time. Since you can't go into overtime though, how do you manage your times? Do you still punch in and out at the time clock like every other TM, or do you just write it down?
 
I just keep track of my hours. They usually schedule me 6am-2:30pm on Mondays so I just enter the total hours for that time and add any additional hours to the shift if needed under a punch correction. I don't clock in at all at Target, I'm not sure if others do..it says that you should under the "best practice" but the it also says to break the shop down into several shops at different times of the day, so you can't exactly clock in when you're not scheduled and I think it would be more of a hassle to have an ETL override every punch that it would require. My STL and ETL don't want me to clock in for it but my HR gets frustrated that I always show up as "Absent" ... you would think there would be an option for them to specify that I'm working away from the store so I don't show up on the absent list but apparently there isn't (or they just haven't figured it out). It's usually pretty close to the 8 hours but sometimes the list is more difficult or longer, and sometimes the device doesn't cooperate. If I'm going to be over 40 I am expected to cut from other shifts at the store (which I don't mind) haha.
 
You don't 'announce' yourself. Be discrete but not secretive. I did some of my shopping there of things that Wally had that my own store didn't carry. I got to know a few of the folk & was always respectful (even told them about some teens wrecking the bike area) but there were one or two I learned to avoid. I usually did their depts late night.
 
A good tool to use for video games and some of those other items that consume a lot of time is the Walmart app. If you can't find it (the store I shop has 4 cases for video games) look it up. It will give you the store price. Saved me from at least 30 not carried items this week because they were just out of stock and flexed.

I wish the Target app would show store prices if different from online...
 
Are the people that come in with crossmark badges and a smaller version of the LPDA comp shoppers? I saw one lady a few days ago and asked an ETL who said not to worry, I just wonder what they were doing, they were scanning everything on the endcaps.
 
NitroKing2110 said:
Are the people that come in with crossmark badges and a smaller version of the LPDA comp shoppers? I saw one lady a few days ago and asked an ETL who said not to worry, I just wonder what they were doing, they were scanning everything on the endcaps.
Click to expand...
Seemed to me that they were checking inventory on certain items. They were in our backroom looking for certain product so I doubt it was for comp shop.

And to those that are being kicked out by Walmart.....they shouldn't be doing that. It's my understanding that Walmart and Target have a gentlemens agreement to allow comp shopping between the two stores. Some stores like you to sign in or let someone know your there (like a vendor). Most of the time one of ours (or one of their employees) are told to leave its by a manager that doesn't know what they're talking about.

About a year ago one of ours was told by a assistant at Walmart to leave. Our pricing tl called the Walmart and spoke to the store manager, who apologized and assured it wouldn't happen again.
 
Last edited:
We're not fortunate enough to have a gentlemens agreement.. Our WM likes to throw us out. Male compshopers in their 20's seem fairly rare so I don't get as many looks when I go.
 
When doing comp shop at Wal - Mart do they ever say anything or ask what you are doing ?
 
When a couple of WM assocs hassled me, I just started going late at night.
Their night crew doesn't care as long as you stay out of their way.
BTW, comp shopping is legal but the store being shopped will likely make up stories of 'disruptive behavior' as reason to ban you.
Our store harassed the hell out of their compers until their management called a truce.
 
I had always wondered how that worked....I had heard that they could kick you out etc
 
I've been thrown out of WM for doing CS. When it happens, someone in the store calls the other WM around us to warn them to watch for me. Ha ha, the rats!

As for a gentleman's agreement, there's no such thing here. WM people are allowed to come into our store and openly do their CS but if we get caught, we get ousted and outright threatened with being banned. There are ways around it, of course. ;-)

:::mumbles something about yet another reason to dislike the evil empire of WalMart:::
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

Ringwraith917
Product design fails
Replies
6
Views
671
IceIceBaby
I
melinora
Bullseye Shop
Replies
12
Views
5K
ommyc
O
tak0000715
Bullseye shop
Replies
1
Views
3K
TargetMcFly
TargetMcFly
V
Companies are closing
Replies
6
Views
390
FlowTeamChick
F
zapp
Signs of Theft in the Company Version 1.0
2
Replies
31
Views
2K
Caliwest
C
Back
Top