The mystery shopper: a tool to measure public service delivery?

Abstract

Originally the exclusive preserve of the private sector, the mystery shopper technique is increasingly being used in the public sector. In the wake of the reforms to modernise the state, accountability and performance-monitoring exercises are on the rise. They focus, in particular, on service quality and user-customer satisfaction. The article makes a twofold contribution to this topic: methodological and substantive. First of all, the article undertakes a scoping review of the literature on the mystery shopper. This review makes it possible to present the mystery shopper technique and its use in the public sector. For this bibliometric study, a sample of 34 papers was analysed. Second, the article offers a summary of the research into the mystery shopper technique, its potential and its limitations. Points for practitioners This article describes the use of the mystery shopper technique in the public sector. The areas for which mystery shopper surveys are commissioned are relatively limited, most being undertaken in the health sector. However, the scoping review emphasises the potential importance of mystery shopping for the purposes of the evaluation. As such, investigating other areas can be very interesting and promising for the public authorities. We also observe from this literature review that the challenges identified during mystery shopper studies can be overcome.