GBW (Formerly known as GAPbuster Worldwide) 

SCAM ALERT:
If you receive an invite via LinkedIn, it means your friend's account has been hacked.

Please contact your friend offline to let them know! Here's an example of an email I received, which my fiend confirmed he did not send (someone else is currently controlling his account):

Hello, Would you like to get paid for reviewing a retail store? Morrison Inc is out looking for a qualified person to assess a store, give a short report on customer service and sales capability in your area. Due to my history with this company I am glad to refer you. You can make as much as three thousand dollars doing this in a month. This program takes 15-20 mins of your free time on each task and each task goes for four hundred dollars. To sign up follow the link below.
[emailmeform.com link cut out]

I have worked for 16 different Mystery shopping companies who all pay when they say they will. I undertook my first assignment for GBW on 2nd February 2018 and expected payment around 22nd March which is their stated payout time. When no payment made I followed up and told another expected date which has now past

I have received emails and calls asking if I will undertake further assignments for them but I am reluctant and I do have my doubts about the long term future of a company who does mystery shops on companies but who themselves perform so poorly.

I will update if I receive payment

This company is bad at paying. Why must one wait 30+ days to get paid? This is becoming a joke.

Update 7 April 2018

Jobs performed 10 to 15 Feb 2018 is finally paid out 6 April 2018. This is how bad. And it would not have happened if I had not called Australia (which was diverted to 'Korean team'), and Malaysia.

Good staff, cool under pressure from me, and never retaliated, management sucks though.

Anyone knows how I can remove myself from the system?

I worked for the then Gapbuster now GBW for about four years or more while I lived in Ireland as mystery shopper. They are for real. They kept to all their promises and I got paid every time I went shopping. I got extra when I had to travel far. The only thing that puzzled me what I sent a request to move my account to my new country and it was never done (administrative problems I guess) and I still get emails about jobs in Ireland even though I no longer live there. There are so many counterfeits of every original today so watch out. If you're looking for free money, there is no such, you do the job and you get paid. Follow the instructions. Simple as that.

I live in Riga (the capital of Latvia).
In the autumn of 2017 I have got an offer to work as a mystery shopper in Latvia, receiving a letter by Russian man Alexander Sopin. He wrote me that he is a manager of company SmartWorld Global and send me a link to their site, where I found the photo of Alexander Sopin.

I had a long business correspondence with Alexander Sopin (in Russian language). But soon I had some suspicion and I decided to conduct an own investigation on the Internet. Soon I found site of GBW, which is a fake copy of the site SmartWorld Global. But man with photo of Alexander Sopin has another name there - Adam Kaye! And other managers from SmartWorld has another names!

When I began to ask Alexander about his company in more detail, he stopped answering my letters!

Conclusions do it yourself!

-------------------------------------------------------------
Reply to GBW (January 29, 2018):
No, you are liars!
1. None of your mailboxes is working! None!
2. And you did not explain, why there is false information about all your employees on the SmartWorld site.

My brother-in-law told me of this company, and how he had completed a lot of eating assignments, all-paid-for. He said it was great. In fact, I thought he was kind of taking advantage of them when admitting he was not very diligent in his reports. Anyway, I decided to give it a try, planning to respect my end of the deal. I completed my first assignment, but then I found filing the report really difficult, with all kinds of technical issues with the web form. In the end, the system did not let me submit because of a bogus error, so I immediately sent an email, as we are supposed to (filing must be done on the same day).
I got an answer 2 days later, telling me to try again. This time, I succeeded, or appeared to succeed. The next day, they wrote an email saying that my assignment had been cancelled. HUH?

I wrote that I had done as requested on my end, and therefore I was expecting payment. Still waiting for an answer.
I see that many people have had similar issues. My brother-in-law confirms what I read from many posters here, that the move to Malaysia turned this company into a disaster.
Luckily, I am only out 16,15 CAD. It seems the company reads this blog. Im curious to see if they respond that I have been paid even if not true. If so, Ill make sure to come back here and set the record straight. LOL
Anyway, I hate scams, and this seems to be bordering on being one.

Update: They asked me to send in my receipt, "even though someone else had completed my assignment" (well not my fault I say), and they mentioned they would "take it from there", whatever that means. I sent it in one week and a half ago. No news since.

Update: Jan 27, 2018: They wrote to say they are upset I went online to discuss the matter. They said they would pay me as "good gesture" (my wording). They gave no date, and no amount. Given the number of reviewers who were promised payments that never came, I will make sure I update if I get paid. Until then, assume I did not.

Update Jan 31 2018: Further to the company reply on this site, they expedited a prompt paypal payment of 20$ (my claim was 16,15$) along with an apology. Thank you for this, and just as big a thank you to Trust Pilot. Now I need to decide whether I want to sign up for more assignments.

Horrible. Horrible experience. I was scammed this week out of 3,550 by a company posing to be GBW and was asked to do a customer service survey for target. They had a copied replica of their website, a customer service email and everything ! I was contacted via USPS!!!! And then was subsequently sent text messages that still have not stopped. I tried to contact the actual GbW several times and no one has gotten back to me or seems to care. Target also “feels bad” but have no policy that protects customers to address this. Have spent hours on the phone with them and nothing. Also I have opened up a grand larceny complaint against the suspects with the NYPD. Anyone who is having The same issue with this should conTact the 19th Precint asap to report. Mail fraud has been occurring in Manhattan so that may also be the way they are getting info. Shame on GBW for not answering any of my 5 queries and shame on target for dOing nothing.

I was scammed $2,500.00. I received a LinkedIn email from an old friend asking me to become a secret shopper. I responded that I was interested and started to receive emails from GBW Shoppers - Thomas Eddie asking if I was ready for my first assignment. Long story short - I was sent an assignment to shop Target in NYC along with a bank check for $2,900. I got to keep $400 off the top.
Little did I know that I cashed a bad bank check and now responsible by my bank for the money and all the gift cards have a zero balance.
I realized later that my friends real LinkedIn profile is no longer active.
The LinkedIn email where this hell started looked real...$2500.00 gone. Sucks!

The company seems to be fraudulant. I have just searched in web: they have a clone account globalsmartworld

Here they name their stuff (tab "our people") with different names htan on the Gapbuster website.
It means on two websites the same people with the same fotos have different names! I suppose it is a legal issue even.
Check out the link our people of globalsmartworld and compare it with this our people on the gbw website.

The same fotos, but totally different names of employees.
It looks like a fake.

I worked for gapbuster for a few years, payments were always late, They didn't pay me for 3 months. Til this day im still waiting for my payments from assignments I had done for 3 months and they keep saying invalid bank account number. I don't understand how come all of a sudden its invalid when i've used it for many years and now I don't get payment.
Its a total bull kaka company, they don't reply to my emails and all I want is my payment of 3 months hard work. DONT WORK FOR THEM. GAPBUSTER WILL RIP YOU OFF.

Just had "George" on the phone again regarding my missing payments. The whole company stinks like a kipper! I do not expect ever to see my money. I have spoken to the company over the contact pages several times and dozens by phone.But with CCJ's against them and losing their big clients I cant see this lot of slippery customers keeping afloat much longer. Avoid at all costs.

Well i signed up with them and applied for my first assignment but after reading so many bad reviews I decided to cancel the assignment. Nothing worse than not being paid for all your time and effort.

Well I stopped working for GAPbuster in November 2016, was fed up of late payments but kept my account open to see if anything improved. Then I noticed Shell Uk stopped using them, I asked Gap about got told “they are redesigned the program” found that a bit weird as I had just done three shell uk jobs for another company.. Now they have lost their largest Client McDonald’s. Meaning don’t be surprised if you don’t get paid. They will need the money to cover their own overheads. I think it was the last call on the “GapMac” they already have a couple of CCJ in the UK for unpaid rent on their offices. So I went to close the account down, they cant even do that right and funny enough the email address on the page even bounces back…..

Would give zero stars if I could. I am still waiting for payment for assignment I did in mid june. I have emailed twice and have been told there is a problem with their bank and to be patient. I have had this problem previously also. Suspect they have cash flow issues, either that or are just scammers. I also work for 3 other mystery shopping companies where I have had no problems. I will not be doing anymore work for gapbuster. Avoid!

Have not paid me for the 8 assignments I've done for them in June. Now 11 days overdue. No more McDonald assignments online, I suspect they've lost the account.

Legal action will be taken at the end of the month if money has still not been paid against their UK office in the civil courts.

I received a check for $1984.50 to do two moneygram transactions a deposit in my bank and waited for the funds to be come available. Will my bank said the check was no good I was charged a return check fee for $35 I've been emailing them about "not a word". This company should be prosecuted.

Thursday 10th August 2017
Please be aware that Gapbuster - known as GBW Solutions - mystery shopping are skimming money when they offer you jobs. I have worked for this firm for over 15 years and since their new management changed; the practices they do on behalf of their clients (who I'm sure don't know what's going on) are boardering on illegal.
This is what they do - please be warned:
If the GBW handlers can't fill an assignment they will offer to negiotiate the price with you. What they do is agree a price of say, £15 per assignment, and then pay you the original stated fee say of £10. You do the shop but only discover this when they pay you a month and a half later. GBW handlers keep the money themselves - which in this example is the £5. Times that by how many assignments there are and that's a lot of cash to be skimming, especially when GBW handlers are on a tiny wage, working in a poor country overseas.
I can understand the temptation but this is fraud! And there is no recourse for UK mystery shoppers because the firm is based overseas in Malaysia.
I was so concerned about what's going on that I raised this issue with GBW several times, who not surprisingly, shut down my account.
I then telephoned the marketing dept of one of their clients - B&Q - to tell them what's been going on. B&Q are investigating so they tell me.
Please do not use GBW Solutions mystery shopping as I think how they conduct their business is fraudulent and wrong. Please BEWARE!

I have done hundreds of assignments with Gapbuster and found very few problems if any. As long as the assignment is carried out properly, they pay well and in a reasonable time.

Unfortunately, they are no longer offering KFC or McDonalds jobs which were my preferred assignments and the alternatives like B&Q or Homebase do not interest me.

If they start up McDonalds again, I would have no hesitation in accepting their assignments.

The McDonalds assignment are easy to complete and pay well. However they are no longer available so unlikely to participate anymore as other assignment (eg. B and Q, Tesla) does not suit me.

no problems with them if you do the job correctly as per the brief and buy correct items and fill out the report accurately and truthfully then you will get paid depending when you did the job the payment can take up to 2 months but mostly paid in 1 month.