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ABSTRACT
This article reports on a program of exploratory research aimed at examining the practice of mystery shopping in service organizations. Mystery shopping, a form of participant observation, uses researchers to deceive customer service personnel into believing that they are serving real customers or potential customers. The research focused on the views of senior managers responsible for commissioning mystery shopping research and directors of market research agencies responsible for the provision of such research. The research findings identify the manner in which mystery shopping is used and the methods used to maximize the reliability of the technique. The study also revealed that employees' acceptance of this form of deception appears to be critical if the results are to be taken seriously by service personnel and if industrial relations within the organization are not to suffer. (c) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Mystery shopping, a form of participant observation, uses researchers to deceive customer-service personnel into believing that they are serving real customers or potential customers. This deception is aimed at monitoring the consistency of processes and procedures used in the delivery of a service. Use of the technique throughout the world is growing. In the United Kingdom alone, the market for mystery shopping is valued at around $30-45 million per annum (Wilson, 1998), with this market research approach being used quite extensively by organizations in financial services, retailing, motor dealerships, hotels and catering, passenger transportation, public utilities, and government departments. This article reports on a program of exploratory research aimed at identifying the reasons for using mystery shopping as well as describing the manner in which the technique is practiced in these sectors.
THE ORIGINS OF MYSTERY SHOPPING
The use of participant observation, where the researcher interacts with the subject(s) being observed, has its origins in the field of cultural anthropology. Anthropologists would take part in a tribe's daily life in order to understand the norms, attitudes, and behaviors that were neither documented nor communicable via language. Such observation also allowed the researcher to overcome some of the potential weaknesses of interviewing and survey research. Friedrichs and Ludtke (1975) highlighted three of these weaknesses. First, there is often a discrepancy between real and reported behavior. Occasionally, statements are made in interviews that are...