I am a single woman who was really exicted to relocate for a great job opportunity. With all the stress of having to move in a couple of weeks, I did my research on moving companies. My father whom lives approximately 1,000 miles from me would review some of the quotes that I received from moving companies. We finally decided on Moving Vanlines. Even though they were a little on the expensive side, my father noticed that they had been registered with the BBB (Better Business Bureau) and the way that my estimate was broken down with a flat travel rate and 3 hours labor, I would be set and that they would probably be the best bet.
So, with no hesitation I decided to sign on with them. First, it was the usual deposit that I had to give them up front to confirm which was no problem. But on my actual moving day, things went from anxious to stressful. The moving guys (2 men) arrived on site late to start things off. The one guy tried to talk me into extra purchases including packing things up, etc. He told me that he was unable to take my glass coffee table and as he is doing all of this - of course, the time clock had begin. So, technically now I was down to one guy moving me.
I live in a 750 S.F. Place with 1 entertainment center, 2 couches, 1 W/D, 1 Canopy Bed, and approximately 20 small office boxes to move and had 3 hours budget in the estimate and it took them close to 1.5 - 2 hours to load up. And on top of that, I had to speed things along by moving boxes down the stairs and moving my own things to help speed things up since one of the movers felt that taking a smoke break was more important. On top of that, they could not take my TV, so I had to carry that to my car along with some of my glass table tops, etc. To make matter worse, when I got to my new apartment, the mover had the audacity to not be aware that they were moving me from a 2nd to a 3rd floor unit (which I clearly told the representative when I was sending out for quotes), and he asked if I would be able to put my bed together.
Me, not being the most mechanically inclined person told the mover to put the bed together and if there wasn't enough time, then to unload the boxes and leave them downstairs (and I would just have to carrry the boxes myself up the stairs). Then, he pursuaded me to give them a tip and if I didn't that he would go ahead and charge me another hour because supposedly, they went over by 10-15 minutes. So, without any choice, I had to tip these guys even though I don't think they deserve it since I had to move and sweat all day and I'm paying them to move. Yeah!
Anyways, about a week later when I got settled in I did contact the representative (note - whom I did contact with all of the problems on my move day, but she (Liz) had strangely disappeared for the day of my moving) and told her about my awful experience and I did file a complaint with the owner. He just said that he would connect me to the complaint office and that there was nothing else that they could do.
Well, from my long story, I hope this could be of some help to someone out there who is about to move. I used a moving company in which I payed approximatley $800 to move me from the St. Petersburg, FL area to Ft. Myers, FL from a 2nd FL apartment unit to a 3rd FL apartment unit which is approx. 750 s.F. With 2 guys, 3 hours of labor should had been plenty, but instead, this company took advantage and milked the time in order for these two employees to get some extra money and to take advantage of a single woman who is just looking for someone to move herself and for them to have the gaul to ask her to move her own stuff and build her own bed/carry her own boxes.
I will never use Moving Vanlines (Tampa, FL) again. It's one thing to have awful employees but its another thing for the representative or owner to not be available or to alieve the situation. What they should had done was taken these 2 guys (or the 1 guy - supervisor) off the job and replaced them with a different crew that could had performed the job that I was paying them to do.
Thank you.
Morgan
Ft. Myers, Florida
U.S.A.
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