Although the contract I have is with All Points Van Lines, Inc. The original company I requested the quote from and dealt with was West Point Relocation. Therefore, when I received the contract with the All Points Van Lines letterhead from the people who picked up my belongings, I was surprised. I did a lot of research before deciding upon a moving company. However, it is really difficult to check up on a company (West Point Relocation) when there are no complaints about the company at all. It is also daunting to find that that's really NOT the company who was moving your stuff.
We moved from California to Hawaii. We were given a quote of $2,950 for our home belongings and $1,195 for the car. I asked the representative Chris B to send someone out so that they can give me a better estimate. He told me that it is my right to ask for that, however, it is not necessary because they do this all the time and can 'eyeball' it.
I called many times asking many questions and because we wanted to lower the cost of our shipment, I said I'd try to sell some bulky items. Chris B told me that the cost is based upon the cubic feet so naturally, the less bulky items I had the cheaper it will be. So, I proceeded to sell our washer/dryer, beds and other furniture which I had originally quoted to Chris B.
The first down payment I had to pay was for $1,668. After I had sold the stuff, I called Chris B and told him I had substantially less things now and wanted him to give me another quote. Again he reassured me that when the movers came, they can judge better because they can see it. He said that naturally it would cost less if there was less stuff than I had given him.
The day the movers came, they showed up in a Budget rent-a-van. There were 2 guys. We didn't really have much stuff at all considering, yet it took them almost 2 hours to do the work and in the end, quoted me more cubic feet than ORIGINALLY quoted even AFTER I had sold most of our furniture. They also charged me for packing materials which they insisted MUST be used so that things would ship well and wouldn't break.
When I spoke with Eli, another representative of West Point Relocation, he told me that our things (and our car) would arrive in about 3 weeks. The movers came on Dec 19th and took our stuff away. I called them today (January 5) and inquired about our belongings. We were told that they are en route and that the estimated date of arrival would be January 23. That's 2 more weeks than promised.
That aside, now I'm worried that we might experience everything everyone's written about on here, worse yet, never see our things again. Because of this, we are having to rent a car for another 2 weeks, which in Hawaii, costs an arm and a leg. If they had been honest about the time of arrival, I would've been able to better plan our move so that it wouldn't have cost as much as it already has.
My concern is that the company I originally went with, West Point Relocation, somehow has sub-contracted the move to All Points. This is fraudulent to say the least because when you search for complaints on West Point Relocation nothing pops up, while All Points garners too many hits to mention. Even the emails I received from the reps are from West Point Relocation, NOT All Points. How can consumers make good choices when information like this is kept from them?
Right now, all I'm praying for is that my things arrive on the 23rd and that not too many items are damaged because from reading the posts here, I doubt I will get reimbursed for much if they are. Why is a company like All Points still allowed to stay in business?
Anita
Mountain View, California
U.S.A.
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