On Your Side: Secret Shopping Agent App
There’s a free way to add big bucks to your holiday budget. And if you love shopping, you can now cash in with the app that wants to pay you for being a secret shopping agent
Rick West is the co-founder of Field Agent, a smartphone app that crowdsources location specific data from consumers for which companies are paying cash.
“We can put cash in your hands in a very simple way,” he said.
The app is free and available on the Apple store and Android store. The app requires you to accept ‘jobs’ in your area that asks you to browse for cell phones, search for different products and even engage workers in a mystery shop. The jobs require the user to take some pictures or answer some questions.But users cannot tell the stores what they are doing. Finishing a task rewards users with a set amount of money.
Field agent jobs change daily, so it pays to check back often. Once a job has been completed by another agent, it's no longer available.
“You could be standing 20 feet from making $20 bucks and not even know it,” West said.
Before, companies would have to hire a private contractor to conduct this kind of research. But now, smartphone technology puts all the tools needed in the palm of your hand.
More than 800,000 users have signed up for the app. The company is on track to pay out about $4 million this year in $3, $5 and $10 increments
The cash rewards are available instantly and are paid out through PayPal. Users can up earn up to $600 or more, tax-free.
And now is the best time to sign up. It's a busy season for sellers and that means they're looking for secret agents.
So who hired the secret agents? Who cares!
“While you think it was Verizon who hired you or Budweiser or Coke, you don't really know!” West said.
It's all kept quiet so there’s no influencing your answers.