moving experience with Old Dominion Household services
doing some research on moving from CA to NY the OD Household was the cheapest service I could find and experience was very positive. everything on time and nothing damaged.
Moving service was scheduled online via odmove.com, even got $75 coupon over a phone from OD sales folks which was a big plus. During booking they ask if you need cargo straps: these straps have special hooking latches so typical hardware store straps with "S" hooks will not work if you trying to attach them inside trailer, store straps can be used to hold things together inside truck on it's own and I've used them to hold boxes and other things, so if you have big items like spring box I would recommend to get OD straps. The hand truck and ramp are included for free at load and unload points. How much space will you need? I started with 4 linear feet inside trailer (trailer 8' Wide and 9'Tall and I think U-haul box designed to fit inside standard trailer
but U-haul charges more for service and you have to pay extra $100 for U-box usage as well, so screw U-haul). if you go over initially ordered footage OD will charge you actual footage used and rate is disclosed then you book trailer so no surprises here.
Day before trailer delivery local OD office called and confirmed. asked about desired time but since I was at home I was able to meet them at any time. just be careful, according to OD website if you set specific trailer delivery time you may be charged extra $150, for free you will get a time window for delivery which is pretty fair in my books.
So trailer is here and you have 3 days to load your stuff. if you packing any furniture use blankets to protect surfaces from damage, blanket will protect surfaces from rubbing against other solid surfaces. if you use cardboard only, cardboard will behave like a very fine sand paper and will damage surfaces. I've used blankets on inside and cardboard panels on outside for double protection. Trailer may have some holes (our had) so water damage is a possibility, so anything touching floor should be wrapped in plastic. then you package trailer think of it as puzzle, everything what goes inside should fit extremely tight, any free movement can result in damage to your stuff. OD trailers have a nice future, drop down horizontal beams so you can load stuff in two levels. OD website has video on how to use them. One unpleasant think I discovered about these bars during move: to move them down you have to pull latch, to move up just push them up, no latching mechanism. I had things strapped to these bars and what happened: moving truck hits pot hole that caused boxes attached to bars jump and pull bars upward from their original position so then trailer arrived everything packaged on second level was no longer sitting on flat surface and straps lost some tension, no damage through. if you packing anything in second level make shure it fits tight to the roof of the trailer or use OD straps to lock bars in place Also I've used bicycle boxes which I got from LBS to package bulky stuff like paintings and picture frames and these boxes fitted perfectly on second level.
Pickup: Driver arrived during negotiated time frame, hooked up trailer to truck and fun begun. How OD measure distance inside trailer is a bit of a hassle, he measured it from back of the trailer and got one number, I measured from the front of the trailer and got different number, after about 20 minutes of calling office to figure out length of trailer and using piece of wood we came to conclusion of how much space was used (I won), not the best use of my time but ok, after all difference in his and my measurements was 2ft (~$300) so I wasn't going to let them charge me more for space which I was not using.
next surprise: inside trailer they have vertical rails for straps attachment and they (OD drivers) use these rails as base for measurement. Rails are spaced at 16" not 12" so increments will be to a next rail (my staff were about 6" away from closest rail at 5' mark) so actual spaced used was ~4'8"I paid for 5' but if you an inch over rail and driver cannot insert security divider be ready to pay for extra 2 feet as 16" (to a next rail) can be rounded to 24"..... so then you pack leave about 3" of space between your stuff and closes vertical rail so driver can install security bar and plywood sheets without extra charge to you. I called OD later and suggested to add piece of tape to the wall so it's clear how much space is used without wasting time and told them it would be nice if amount of space you can select is based on space which can be used between vertical rails and not mythical "feet" numbers as in reality these rails spaced 16" apart. After signing paper truck left my location and trailer was on it's way....
Unloading: OD called when trailer arrived (in 5 days from Ca to NY) to schedule delivery, OD will give you 3 days to unload you trailer. since we moved to Upstate NY in early March the town we live in has ban on street parking after midnight (so snow plows can move freely) make sure trailer can fit inside your driveway as if you park on the street police will write you a ticket. if driveway is too short look for manpower to help you unload truck in one hour, if you spend more then one hour of life unloading OD will charge about $100/h for holding truck at your place. I kept trailer overnight and OD picked it up in the morning next day... Done
overall very positive experience and definitely will use them again.
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I also had a good experience with OD Household moving service
