I was recently told that I do not have to claim income on any shops for a company if it does not exceed 600.00. I was also informed that the reimbursement for items purchased in the shop does not need to be considered income either. Can you help?

Yes. You must claim ALL mystery shopping income, no matter how little a particular MSC might pay you.

With reimbursements, there are two ways that they can work: Either you simply don't claim them as income - most easily done if the MSC does not include them on your 1099. Or, you claim the reimbursed amount as income, but take it right back off again as a business expense. It's a wash, either way. For the sake of simplicity, I include all of them as income and then business expenses as some MSC's include reimbursements as part of your income on your 1099. This way, I'm doing it the same way for all my accounting.

Thanks.