Please read below regarding "All My Sons Moving and Storage" out of Boca Raton, Florida. They also have locations throughout Florida in Jupiter, West Palm Beach, Wellington and Port St. Lucie as well as several states across the country. Their website address is www.allmysons.com.
This is a true life account of my experience with this company and I want to get the word out to as many people so that they don't fall victim of their scam like my wife and I did. Although this is a wee bit long, it could make for some great bathroom reading. Please read this and pass this on to as many people possible.
My wife and I were living in Southeast Florida and earlier this year, we decided to look into houses in the Houston, TX area. We found that it was much cheaper "out west, " so we decided to start interviewing and looking for homes in the area. Within 1 visit, my wife landed a job (making more than she was in Florida) and we found a great house that we immediately put a bid on. My wife took her job, moved in with my family, who also lives in the area, and I flew back to Miami to continue work there while flying back and forth to Houston for interviews.
As my wife enjoyed the lap of luxury in Houston, fine dining, daily happy hours after work, laundry service, the mother-in-law to daughter-in-law talks, and a seven minute commute to work, I survived on cereal, pasta and hot dogs and still had to cope with the hour and 1/2 commute to work every day. Her duties were to buy new bedroom set and invest in a nice washer and dryer.
When I left my wife in Houston, the only list of duties I was handed to do back in Miami were to 1.) finish packing up the apartment, 2.) land a dang job in Houston and 3.) find a moving company. Well finishing up the packing was the easy part, I FINALLY did land a job in Houston, but finding a mover was becoming more and more frustrating.
I went on several websites and called several companies to get quotes. Most of the companies were begging for my business and selling the "we are the best, beware of everyone else" mantra. Working in downtown Miami, I kept seeing "All My Sons - Moving and Storage trucks day after day pulled up to office building, apartments etc etc etc. I called them to get a quote and spoke to a woman by the name of Reesa in the Boca Raton office.
For the most part, I got the same sales pitch from her. Beware of other movers, do your research, we have no hidden charges. She also was very personable saying that I share the same name as many people in her family. At that point, even though I had never heard of this company, they were not only winning me over with how friendly Reesa was, but I also thought, hey they can't be that bad, I see them everywhere. BIG MISTAKE!
All My Sons is a company that charges by how much your items weigh, which is pretty typical of many companies. I informed Reesa that I had a 2 bedroom apartment, but I wanted to offer that I moved from Connecticut 2 years ago and the total weight of my items at that time was about 4200 pounds. I informed Reesa that for the most part nothing has changed since then with the exception of a heavier kitchen table and we replaced a chair with a love seat.
I estimated that my total pounds were now in the neighborhood of 4400-4600 pounds. She appreciated the info but suggested that they send a "Experienced Estimator" out to see my stuff first hand to provide a more accurate weight total. (Something to do with balancing the truck space to do multiple moves at once.) Reesa absolutely assured me that regardless of what the estimator comes up with, I will only pay what the actual pounds are weighed at.
I was told that this is simply done by weighing the truck empty and then with my items on it. Mistake number 2... Which I'll learn when I actually get my stuff. Reesa, although she denies it to this day, said that the it would take 5-7 days for my furniture to get from Miami to Houston.
The Estimator came out to my apartment later in the week and went through everything. Box by box, item by item.in the end, she came up with a total of 5012 pounds. I told her that I really think she is on the high side, and that I thought it was actually in the neighborhood of 4400-4600 pounds. She also reassured me that regardless of the number that she comes up with, I would only pay on the actual weight of my items.
She went on to total everything up and she added in cost of materials too. -Quilt pads, shrink wrap, ect etc. She initially came up with a total of $3700.00. I thought that was a little on the high side so I started to talk her down. I used every trick I learned from my Dad. "Never accept the first offer, tell them you'll think about it and that you got a much lower price from someone else.."
After much ado, talking her down to the lowest interstate tariff, and several phone calls made by her back and forth to "home office, " she came up with an estimated price of $3349.00. I thought, I could live with that, knowing that it's would come in much cheaper anyways because I KNEW she was way over her weight estimate. At that point, I said I would think about it overnight and get back to them. She left the estimate (which we both signed) and she went home.
The next day, I called my wife and filled her in on the movers. I told her I was pretty stealthy the way I talked her down in price and went on to say that I had a pretty good feeling about them. She said, that if I had a good feeling to go ahead and hire them. I called back Reesa that same day and informed her that I'd like to go ahead and hire them. She was absolutely ecstatic! Saying that they would take great care of us, I wouldn't regret my choice. Yada yada.
I gave her all the info she needed to book the business. (To give a quick background. We closed on the house in Houston on March 8th; however I gave my wife power of attorney because there was no way I could physically be there and handle the movers, pack up the SUV in Miami and give a pep talk to the dogs to behave themselves for the upcoming 1200 mile drive in the back of the SUV.) Given that Reesa initially gave me a 5-7 day window for our furniture to arrive, I gave her a pick-up date of March 6th.
I thought, ok - our furniture would probably arrive at the new house on Saturday, March 11th, but if they run late it would get there on Monday, the 12th. Either way it would be fine because my start date of the new job wasn't until March 12th. I also gave Reesa a $100.00 credit card deposit to officially book the move. For those of you following the math so far - Estimate - $3349.00 - $100.00 = $3249.00 - estimated amount due for 5012 pounds
On March 5th, I got a call from John, "the manager" at All My Sons telling me that the movers would be there between 6:00-9:00am on March 6th. I said to him, "WOW, 6am, huh, you guys don't mess around." To which he replied, "nope, we like to get an early start and get the job done."
At this point, I was still confidant in them. March 6th came and at 8:30am, the moving truck pulled up to my apartment door. Again, the movers were courteous, friendly, polite. Etc etc and they seemed to know what they were doing. They numbered each and every items with a red number and wrote the corresponding number onto an inventory list.
The only concern I had during the entire loading of the truck was how they packed a few lamps. For some reason, they thought packing glass lamps in brown paper, which had the consistency of wrapping paper, would protect them from breakage. I questioned them and was told not to worry, that the way the truck was packed they would be VERY safe.
Within 3 hours, they had the entire truck loaded up and the only left to do was the paperwork and give them another money order for $1056.00 to be applied to the estimated balance due. At this point it was just the driver and me left in the apartment. We made a little small talk. Where you moving to? What do you do for a living? Typical small talk as I was signing the paper work.
Two things that raised a flag to me was, 1) the drop off address of my furniture was the address of All My Sons Storage facility and 2.) they asked me to sign away my right to physically view the truck weight. I questioned both of these to the driver and was given plausible answers for both. I was told the truck is going back to the storage facility for a night and they will load my items onto a new truck that was bound for Texas the next morning, As far as waiving my right to view the weight of the truck, all the driver had to say was, relax, we are not in the business of lying to you, we are going to take good care of you. He seemed like a nice guy, so I trusted him. ANOTHER BIG MISTAKE!
For those of you doing the math Estimate - $3349.00 - $100.00 - $1056.00 = $2193.00 estimated balance due for 5012 pounds. I called John, "the manager" later that day and he also confirmed for me that a truck was leaving the next morning. I also asked him for the balance due so that I could go to the bank and get a cashier's check. He said the balance due was $2193.00.
I replied, wow, you guys were DEAD ON with the weight, how much did the truck weigh? He replied that he did not have the weight infront of him, but my paper work said, "2193.00 due at delivery. I thought it was a little odd, but unfortunately, I couldn't question or second guess it because we did not have a bank set up in Texas yet. I needed to get the balance due at our Florida bank before we left. YOU GUESSED IT, ANOTHER BIG MISTAKE
Two days of staring at the walls and sleeping on an air mattress later, my wife closed on the house and flew home to Miami on March 8th to make the long drive to Houston - that same night. (I give her credit on that one) We decided to leave at 11:00pm on March 8th figuring if we REALLY push it and suck it up, we could get into Houston by 8pm on the 9th. Only stopping for gas, coffee and a #3 at Wendy's in Louisiana, we were right on target to pull into our "new" driveway at 8:30pm on the 9th.
Little did I know that at 1pm on March 9th, while driving through Alabama, All My Sons would start with their scam. I called John to get a status on the location of our furniture. John got on the phone and I asked him for an ETA of our stuff. There was dead silence on the phone for what seemed to be an eternity. He replied, "what do you mean?" I said, ummm, what do you mean, what do I mean??? You said the truck was leaving Wednesday morning bound for Texas." He replied, "no I didn't. I said the truck was leaving, maybe NEXT Tuesday or Wednesday."
Admittedly, I got a little "excited" at that point and started to yell. No sleep, driving for the past 14 hours and surviving on a bad cup of coffee and 1/2 of a hash brown wasn't helping in the crankiness factor. John said he would look into it and get back to me.
I immediately called Reesa and asked her what a going on. I figured she would help me. After all, I had the same name as 1/2 of her family. I explained to her what I was just told by John, to which she replied, uh huh. What the problem?" My heart was racing, my blood pressure was boiling and I felt helpless driving on I-10 through the middle of nowhere in Alabama.
I said, I was told by John that a truck was leaving with our stuff on March 7 AND I was told by you that I would have our stuff 5-7 days after pick-up. Reesa replied, I NEVER told you that. I told you that you would receive you items 10-14 days after the truck left storage. Again, I got a wee bit excited and started to scream. I think Reesa got tired of the barrage of insults about her company so she stopped me and said she would look into it too.
At that point, my wife turned to me and said that she thinks it would be a good idea that she drives for awhile and I get some sleep. As you can also imagine, I got no call back from All My Sons that day. Yelling at all my sons. PROBABLY ANOTHER MISTAKE.
Six hours after the last phone call with All My Sons, 4 stops to get gas (SUV's are terrible to drive cross country with), 4 stops to let the dogs, pee, poop and eat, 3 stops to get coffee and as I mentioned that stop in Louisiana to get that #3 at Wendy's, we pull into our driveway in Texas. Not knowing when our stuff would actually get there. Saturday morning came and I was dialing All My Sons as soon as I got up. Of course, no one was available to give me a status until Monday morning.
Monday morning came and my wife went off to work. Again, I immediately got on the phone with John trying to get our stuff to us. At that point, I was informed by him that he had a truck coming back into dispatch that night and our furniture would be loaded on and it would go out Tuesday morning. I breathed a sigh of relief. I called my wife and told her the good news.
Ok, yes, our stuff wasn't going to be there within the 5-7 days, but at least we would have our stuff by that coming Saturday - the following Monday latest. I started my new job on March 14 and thankfully I brought enough "work and play clothes" to last me a week. TRUSTING JOHN'S WORD - ANOTHER MISTAKE.
On Friday, March 16th, I decided to call John from work to get an ETA of our furniture. I thought best case scenario, we would have everything the very next day. Worst case scenario, I would have a take a day off from work on Monday to meet with the movers. John got on the phone and I asked very enthusiastically, when I would be getting my furniture. Wouldn't you know that John had the cajones to say, Our furniture was STILL in Florida.in storage and they were waiting for the truck to get back so they could load it. As you can imagine, I lost it.
John of course was no help at all. He wasn't apologetic nor did he seem to care that we didn't have OUR stuff. John said he would give me a call when he had more info. Before he was able to hang up the phone and put me out of his mind until I called him again, I asked him in a curious sort of way. "Hey, by the way, how much did the truck weigh?" He put me on hold, came back a few minutes later and said, 4500 pounds.
I was excited at this point. I said to him, "oh, that means the balance due is not $2193.00, it's less?" He simply said "no, why?" I replied, "the $2193.00 balance due was based on a 5012 pound estimate." John replied, "no, you paid a flat rate." As you can imagine, I now had to take the conversation outside because the screaming that was about to happen would frighten old ladies and small children. I ran outside all the while yelling, I did not pay a flat rate, I paid based on weight! What kind of scam are you running?" He said, "no, you had an estimator come out to your home so you paid a flat rate based on what she estimated."
I exploded! I went on to scream that I told both Reesa and the estimator that I thought their numbers were high and it was more in the 4400-4600 range. The ASSURED me that regardless of what the "estimate" is, I would only pay on actual weight." He replied, "no that is not true. Once you agree to have an estimator come to your house, you are locked into the rate she estimates."
I told him that your estimator needs to be fired then because I did a better job estimating than she did. Needless to say, John was now subject to a barrage of insults about him, his company, his wife, his grandmother and his dog. My parting words to him were, I better have my furniture on MONDAY and NOTHING better arrive broken!
I called my wife shortly there after, informed her of the "current situation" and filled her in on the weight/estimator scam they were running. Curious about this, she called her mother and asked her to call the company pretending to be a new customer; likewise, I did the same thing. We BOTH asked the question, "What method do you use to charge for a move?" We were both told... By 2 different sales reps, 5 minutes apart, "we charge based on weight of your items.
We weigh the truck empty then with your furniture and that is how compute the total amount due. We each asked the follow-up question, "if an estimator comes out to your place to view your items, does that mean you waive the above method and you pay "whatever the estimator comes up with and pay a flat rate." We each were told, Nope, you pay on actual weight, it is as simple as that. There are no hidden charges with us. (YEAH, RIGHT!)
At any rate, several more phone calls were exchanged between myself and All My Sons over the next two weeks and our furniture FINALLY arrived at our new place on March 25. Thirteen days after the promised date. BUT - My problems were far from over. As cold and callas at this may sound, I already resided to the fact that I was NOT going to tip the movers. I figure I was being over charged by 600 pounds worth of stuff, their tip could come out of that "overpayment."
I knew I was in trouble when the driver got off the truck (at 10:15am on a Sunday morning) said they were hungry and asked us to order them a pizza. I replied, it's 10:15 on a Sunday morning. No pizza place is going to be open at least until 11am. Not only that, I thought, I don't want greasy pizza hands all over our NEW house and furniture.
The driver apparently did not like my answer because he immediately got an attitude. He came back 15 minutes later with all the paperwork, called into "someone" at All My Sons that he had arrived at the house and asked me to pay him in advance before unloading the truck, as that is company policy. I reluctantly handed him over the overcharged balance due of $2193.00 and waited for my stuff to come rolling in.
Thirty minutes later, I walked outside to see where my stuff was and although the truck was there, the two movers were nowhere in sight. Another 15 minutes pass and they emerge from the truck - in different clothes - and are now saying that it's after 11:00, can we order them a pizza now? I thought, MY GOD, if it will get my furniture in the house that much faster. We'll feed them. I handed them the menu for the local pizza joint and walked away. He called and decided that $25.00 was too expensive for two large pizzas and a couple of cokes.
What planet is this guy from? Too Expensive? I would think they were giving them some kind of early bird - after church special at that price. As they started to carry our furniture in, I asked him to wait just 1 second so I could check off all the items on the inventory list as they brought it off the truck into the house. I was told, "No, we'll know our stuff. We'll know if something is missing" I tried to do it anyway - against his wishes, but I now found that the red numbers which were number 1-143 on all of our items, did not correspond with his inventory checklists.
That checklist was numbered 1-10, then started over again - 1-10.. Etc etc. I gave up on that task and walked back inside to check the progress. Hoping we would know if something was missing. As I stepped into the front door, I noticed they were just leaving everything anywhere there was an empty place. Now mind you, we have a 4 bedroom - 2 story house and we had enough furniture for every room.
I temporarily brushed it off as maybe they are going to bring a bunch of things in then put it in it's respective room after. As furniture and boxes started to pile up on the first floor and walking space became limited, I asked Mr, I want a Pizza., "um, are you going to put the furniture where it needs to go?" He nearly knocked me over with his reply and I quote, "No, we don't do that, we are not decorators, we just bring your items in the house." You would think that after waiting 3 weeks for our stuff, they would be falling over backwards to make us happy?
At this point, I was no longer the angry, screaming customer. - My wife, who is a 4'10" and 105 pounds Sicilian laid into him! She even frightened me. As she was tearing him a new one, I was on the phone dialing EVERY All My Sons number I had trying to track someone down. I think by now, every employee knew my cell phone number through caller-id and no one answered - anywhere! I asked the driver, who was now trying to calm my wife down, "what number he called when he arrived at the house.
I wanted to talk to someone RIGHT NOW. He told me, "no one was there today." I said, "BULL, who did he JUST call and talk to?" He said again, "no one is there today." I resided to the fact that he was not going to give up the info so I put down the phone and let my wife finish her rant.
Finally after 15-20 minutes of yelling, the driver backed down and agreed to carry the items to their respective rooms. (Funny thing is, I knew he would. After 3 and 1/2 years of being with her, if we ever have a disagreement, in the end I always end up saying, "you're right. Whatever you want, dear" It was just fun to watch from the outside what it's like to get screamed at by her.)
After 4 hours, everything was finally inside and for the most part where it needed to be. As I was finishing up the paperwork, my wife was taking inventory of things to see if anything was missing. What was the very first thing she noticed? You guessed it. Those lamps that were wrapped in brown paper were shattered into 1000 pieces.
We opened another "self packed" box of lamps. Two lamps that were wrapped in bubble wrap, then towels, and had pillows on of them for further protection. One of the few boxes that had "Fragile" written on every side and a box that came crushed beaten and bruised. Yep, those lamps were shattered into a 1000 pieces too. At this point, we were just tired of everything and thought that if anything else is broken as we open boxes, we'll just file a claim and get at least a portion of our money back.
For the most part, we got "lucky." Most of the rest of our items came intact. Oddly enough, the other box marked "Fragile" that was full of plates wrapped in bubble wrap, newspaper and towels arrived destroyed too. We were able to salvage a few plates and bowls but for the most part, EVERYTHING was shattered. Yes, that even included the set we got for our wedding.
We did end up filling a claim shortly there after. I sent in all the necessary paperwork to the address on their company letter head and included the value and weight of the lamps We have not heard anything to this day. (July 17).
I guess I am somewhat of a sadist because I called to get a status of my claim yesterday figuring 2-3 months was enough time to process it. I was told they never received anything from me. When I confirmed the address with him that everything was sent to according the THEIR letter head, he said it was incorrect and gave me a new address. Just another typical fast one by All My Sons. The icing on the cake to the whole story is when I verbally reviewed my claim with Robert Lopez in their claims dept, I was told that I could resubmit it, but in no way are they responsible for anything they didn't pack.
I just laughed and hung up. My next move, you ask? I called their quote line and acted as a new customer, once again. I plain out asked Jenny and Lauren, who were both handling new requests that day, Regarding your liability insurance, if the customer packs their own items and those items are broken in the move, would All My Sons be responsible? What do you think their answers were? Yep, you guessed it, both of them said, regardless of who packs the items, if the items are broken in the move, All My Sons would be responsible.
I would like to sum this up by saying. This is 100% my own fault. If I had done the research like Reesa had suggested and simply google the phrase, "All My Sons, reviews, " I would have come across countless upon countless warnings against them. Go ahead, try it for yourself.
Please pass this on and warn everyone, DO NOT USE ALL MY SONS - MOVING AND STORAGE!
Prelude1271
katy, Texas
U.S.A.
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