This is about Bekins Moving and Storage in Canada, who are a member of United Van Lines.
This is the stuff that makes me try any method possible to raise the roughly $8000 that I'm going to need to pay off the movers and the warehouse people at this end.
* Family photos, including some one of a kind ones of great great grandparents
* My art school sketchbooks
* Tania's tools for making her art
* Tania's computer
* Paintings and sculptures by friends who have died
* My large scale abstract paintings
* One piece of furniture that could keep us from sitting on the floor
I know all about the things that could have been done differently at this point, but that's all beside the point now. Had I had more time had I had more luck with craigslist had I had more patience had I not had all the pressure in the world on my head it doesn't matter, because what it comes down to is that I stand a chance of losing those few possessions in the world that matter to me should the shipper decide to liquidate the whole lot, selling everything at auction.
I realize that I shouldn't trust people, but when you go to a professional for a service, I expect them to know what they're doing. They are the expert, after all. When I call a moving company and ask if they can come out to do a quote with me, I expect that their answer of No, we can do that over the phone! to be backed up by some sort of a guarantee. I called around, and the mover I had that I felt most comfortable with was Bekins.
When I called Bekins moving in Richmond, BC, I spoke with Lindsay, who assured me that she could give me a price on the move based on her checklist; their stats were very accurate for assessing move prices. After going through the apartment, listing off everything that will be moving, and padding the resulting number of boxes by at least double, Lindsay took over.
I received an email later;
"Attached is your estimate as requested. I think you have closer to 1200 pounds, so the estimate is based on 1200 pounds. If you have any further questions, please contact me on my direct line (604) xxx-xxxx. I will go ahead and book this move for you. I will have your belongings loaded on November 27th and someone from dispatch will contact you on Saturday, November 25th to let you know what time the crew will be arriving to load your belongings."
TOTAL ESTIMATED CHARGES $ 2716.35
On November 25th, I was given a loading start time of 8:30am November 27th.
On November 27th, they hadn't shown up by 10:30am, and had not called. When I called, I find that they hadn't even left the warehouse until after 9:00am, and didn't arrive until nearly 11.
I was already in Halifax by this point, and Tania was stuck with the nightmare loading; with non-moving movers who didn't seem to understand what they were doing. She had planned to have the movers out of the apartment by noon or one so that she could sleep off an all-nighter of last minute packing and cleaning. They arrived hours late, and they left many hours after they reasonably should have.
After Tania left Vancouver, I received a call from the movers; it seems that they have bad news for me. They have weighed the load and discovered that the weight is closer to 3300 pounds, and the moving consultant can't explain it to me. The cost, of course, jumps up to about $7600.
Lindsay offers some insight about there being a lot of plastic tubs or something, which is hard to understand around her lunch. She asks if the load should be shipped to Halifax at this new rate, or if I would like to come down to the warehouse and reduce the weight of the load.
I'm in Halifax, which is roughly as far away from Vancouver as the center of the planet is (~6100 km vs ~6300 km). Tania is on her way. There is no option in my mind at that point but to ship it. I request some time to investigate options. I speak with a banker who is sure that my past bankruptcy isn't an issue in a case like this, and we're sure that there's no trouble. I tell the movers to send the stuff, and we'll figure something out. We go into Christmas season here thinking everything is going to be alright.
Between Christmas and New Years, we find out that my bank doesn't want to touch me, despite what the loans officer had said. They didn't even want to consider a co-signer or anything; just No.
What it amounts to is that we have all these things that we can't touch I have a couple hundred DVDs that I could liquidate to help pay off the costs, but they're in the truck with everything else, and I can't access them. I have art work I could sell, but it's also in the truck. CDs? In the truck. Other misc. items? In the truck.
I don't earn enough that I can pay off the debts incurred in the move, pay for living expenses, AND save up $8000. So, I send the movers a request to negotiate the price, as I still feel that I'm being screwed by what amounts to a bait-and-switch as far as I'm concerned.
They responded late friday, saying effectively Pay us, bi**h. They offered up the nearly attainable payment scheme of $3000 and then four months of $1100, plus the costs of warehousing things here in Halifax (a couple hundred per month). I have the invoice, which means I can file for the last of my moving money from the company (right around $1000), so I can have that in a couple weeks, but it still leaves me well short.
Yes, we're aware of the Better Business Bureau, and we know Bekins has taken care of complaints filed there. The problem is that they're holding the cards right now, and filing a BBB complaint might easily result in them moving forward with liquidating our assets so the plan is to pay them and then complain, for all the good it will likely do.
Richard
Halifax, Nova Scotia
Canada
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