Your experience with professional movers (job transfer, relocation, packing, moving company)

[TashaPosh]

Soon we will be looking to hire a professional moving service from the Bay Area to OC to include packing. Anybody have a reference for a good company in this area that you would hire again? Or any bad experiences that you would stay away from? All I know is other ppl who had movers as part of a relo….(like my ex & i)…AND so it’s hard to tell the quality of service or customer issues because a company paid for it & handled everything. We did have a sofa that was damaged & we were reimbursed….…but would it have been settled as easily without a company contract for lots of relocations out of Torrance?

Anybody you would personally recommend? Thank you.^^

[Parnassia]

Why not post your question in the San Francisco/CA subforum where folks who may have used local companies would see it?

[TashaPosh]

Originally Posted by Parnassia

Why not post your question in the San Francisco/CA subforum where folks who may have used local companies would see it?

Lots of large professional movers go from state to state. So somebody might have had a positive experience outside S.F. or O.C. that could still be helpful.

[Parnassia]

Originally Posted by TashaPosh

Lots of large professional movers go from state to state. So somebody might have had a positive experience outside S.F. or O.C. that could still be helpful.

Of course, but you'll still need to contact a local/regional office so it would be the logical place to start.

[twinkletwinkle22]

Here's what I learned about professional movers: the local mover guy is affiliated with the national brand and is the one who will give you a quote on your move cost and the local guys will be loading the truck (and packing if you hire them to do that). The guys driving the truck don't work for the local guy. They drive the truck, unload at your destination, maybe call in some locals to help. Drivers are also affiliated with the national brand but they are generally not connected to the local guy you spent the most time with at your pickup destination. This is an important thing to know.

There is no point about complaining about anyone except to the national brand and the national brand will be more protective of their franchisees and drivers than they care about you. So buyer beware.

The most important factor is to get a written quote that cannot be increased after they "weigh it". The quote you are given in writing NEVER goes down but can go up if it is worded that way on the contract. Many years ago on a 1200 mile move we got robbed by the driver who demanded $1500 more than we were given a written quote on or he would not unload. It was about 50% more than the written quote. They only take checks or cash because they don't want a credit card company to charge them back.

The whole "weight" thing is a scam because moving companies almost never have only one customers belongings on their truck. On our last move the trucking company encouraged us to follow the loaded truck to "their scales" so we knew the weight was honest. But...1) the truck was half loaded with someone else's stuff before they got to our house to load our stuff and 2) it was after 6 pm before they got our stuff got loaded (they came 2 hrs late) and we had to get on the road to our new home before the truck arrived. Driving to their scales was in the opposite direction and we'd just spent a long, hot day getting everything out of our house.

Good luck with your move. Our last one was the least aggravating move and it was VERY aggravating but we did not get ripped off financially.

[TashaPosh]

Originally Posted by Parnassia

Of course, but you'll still need to contact a local/regional office so it would be the logical place to start.

Tho I’m just trying for any references or positive experiences 1st. IMO it made sense to put it in General Moving…but if you think it should be moved to S.F.^^, that’s totally up to you or a mod.

If no one has any tho, then I’ll start with Bekins.

Originally Posted by twinkletwinkle22

Good luck with your move. Our last one was the least aggravating move and it was VERY aggravating but we did not get ripped off financially.

Thank you. I’m super excited…our 1st new house we bought together. AND it’s an easy driving distance from a lot of our family members & old friends in San Diego & the L.A. area.

[springfieldva]

I couldn't recommend a specific mover in your location. I can say that when we moved for a job transfer, the professional movers were a godsend. I had packed and moved a lot of our things into storage, myself, in order to get our house staged for sale.

Once we sold and it came time to move, the movers came to the house, packed the remaining items and then went to the storage unit and picked up what we had stored there. We were having our new house built so we would be moving into a small temporary rental apartment short term so I had the items marked that would be coming to the rental, the rest would go into storage. The movers showed up with to the temp rental with a big moving truck and unloaded just the items marked for the temp rental, they even put together our beds and other furniture that had been broken down which was nice because we were pretty exhausted from the move. The rest went to storage.

When our house was completed, we rented a truck and moved the stuff from the apartment to our new home. The movers came a couple of days later and dropped off the items we had in storage - which was a lot of stuff.

There is no way that we could have handled all those moving parts alone.

[TashaPosh]

Originally Posted by twinkletwinkle22

The whole "weight" thing is a scam because moving companies almost never have only one customers belongings on their truck.

Thank you…but they come to your house before the move to give you a price AND they estimate weight then. A representative will walk through the house with you room by room & you tell him what is being moved AND you also tell them all items you will be packing AND what you want them to pack. The price they give you doesn’t change based on what they have on the truck…because you’re right….they can have other stuff on there. It would only change if you added more than you originally told them.

So the thing to do IMO is get a couple of different quotes & compare the estimated weight.

[Okey Dokie]

Originally Posted by twinkletwinkle22

Here's what I learned about professional movers:

The whole "weight" thing is a scam because moving companies almost never have only one customers belongings on their truck. On our last move the trucking company encouraged us to follow the loaded truck to "their scales" so we knew the weight was honest. But...1) the truck was half loaded with someone else's stuff before they got to our house to load our stuff and 2) it was after 6 pm before they got our stuff got loaded (they came 2 hrs late) and we had to get on the road to our new home before the truck arrived. Driving to their scales was in the opposite direction and we'd just spent a long, hot day getting everything out of our house.

I worked for an agent of a national van line years ago. Although I’m sure scale shenanigans occur, I think it’s pretty rare. The proper procedure would be to get a new tare (“starting”) weight immediately before loading each shipment. You could ask to see the scale ticket and confirm the date. The driver would also have the bills of lading and scale tickets for any other shipments on board, you could ask to see these to verify the gross (“loaded”) weight of the previous shipment was similar to your tare weight (there may be a slight difference due to amount of fuel, etc.).

How far off was your estimate vs. actual weight?

[TashaPosh]

Originally Posted by Okey Dokie

How far off was your estimate vs. actual weight?

They can’t change the price on the weight estimate tho….because they are the ones that are coming up with it in their quote. As long as you don’t make changes. It’s not done by exact pound. IMO they are estimating it higher than actual but it also goes by how big items are & how much they need to be wrapped or chances it will get damaged. It’s not all about weight. How much of their truck it’s going to fill, how many rooms, if there are stairs, distance & how many men & how much packaging materials will be needed. What moving company did this to you twinkle twinkle? This is the kind of thing I’m asking about.^^ Good & bad reviews.


edit:

Originally Posted by Okey Dokie

I worked for an agent of a national van line years ago. Although I’m sure scale shenanigans occur, I think it’s pretty rare.

Can you recommend them? Thank you.