Suddath Relocation Systems - United Van Lines moving ripoff, lowest quality movers your money can buy Grand Prairie Texas
We moved from Texas to Virginia in July 2004. We interviewed several moving companies and thought we had hired a reputable company that would take care of our belongings and bring them safely to our new home. They were not the cheapest but due to their excessive self-praise, we were led to believe that they would produce a high-quality move. With three children all 3 years old and under, having a smooth move was of vital importance to us.
They kept emphasizing that when the satisfaction survey came, to fill it out and make sure we gave them the highest scores in all the categories of the move. I would much rather have preferred to be able to give them high scores than to have gone through what we did and be writing this now!
Our move involved a one week stay mid-way with family. We repeatedly asked about what would happen to our belongings during that one week time. We were assured that nothing would be removed from the truck.
The packers consisted of 3 men who arrived on time but without the proper boxes. One had to leave and was gone for 3 hours before he returned with the proper boxes. This of course delayed everything during the day. One packer spoke no English and therefore ignored us completely (other than rolling his eyes at us) when we asked him to pack our fragile items carefully.
At the time we assumed everyone was experienced and they would therefore have packed adequately. We did the best we could to help and keep an eye on things but with 3 babies, there is only so much we could do. It was only after unpacking that we discovered he was packing fragile glass pieces, calculators, and even our engraved wooden wedding album unprotected under thick medical textbooks. We were told by another packer at the end of the day, that the packer who spoke no English only worked there because he was a family member of someone at Suddath.
Needless to say, we had a several page list of things that were broken; several, like our wedding album, of immense sentimental value.
The day the truck was loaded, guess what showed up? A Mayflower truck! Not United or Suddath, but another company's altogether! I called Suddath immediately and they suddenly started praising how great Mayflower is and that they are the SAME company. It is interesting how they seemed to think Mayflower was nowhere near as good when I was getting initial estimates! The bottom line is that I contracted with Suddath & United , not Mayflower, & there was NOT a single person from Suddath that was there for the move!
The first thing the driver did upon walking in our house was to start bellowing about why our marble-topped tables were not crated and that he would not move a single thing until craters came out and crated them. When the "experts" at Suddath had assessed our house, they had not indicated they needed to be crated and were therefore not crated by the craters who had been there the day before.
First they wanted to charge us extra for their mistake after they had given us a "firm price" but being it was a holiday weekend, craters were not available and hours later, the driver ended up deciding they didn't really need to be crated after all and he instead wrapped them in blankets and put them on the truck.
The loading proceeded in a fairly disorganized manner and they kept randomly loading items without listing many of them on their inventory sheets. This would later come to haunt us.
The one thing we specifically asked, IN WRITING, was to be extra careful with our beautiful bedroom furniture. Their worksheet reads : "Extra care of MBR rare African wood with lacquer finish". Boy did they take "care" of our furniture alright! They took extra "care" to make sure that every single piece of our prized furniture was damaged irreversibly in some way!
An interesting thing at the other end was that the furnitutre came off in a different order than it was packed and things that went on the truck assembled came off disassembled. Our vaccuum cleaner which went on first and therefore had 14 tons of furniture in front of it came off first and came off with the attachments of someone else's vaccuum cleaner! We believe that our furniture had been unloaded, placed in an unauthorized storage facility for the week, and then reloaded carelessly and that is why so many pieces were damaged, broken and lost.
The final insult came when we reached Virginia. We felt the loaders were working hard and ended up tipping them handsomely. We had purchased a new reciprocating saw to use to repair a few things in our new home. It had never been used and was still in the box. We saw one of the movers carrying it on the truck at destination but it never made it INTO our house. We think it was pawned along with a number of other tools that the loaders placed on the truck without labeling and inventoried and that mysteriously went missing.
We now feel that we tipped them to steal our stuff. We even bought them all lunch and soda at both ends of the move! When we tried to claim these stolen items, Suddath denied the claim stating the items claimed were not inventoried. Was it our fault that their people sent to label the items and list the items did not do their job? It is impossible and ridiculous to expect that the customer should and would be able to check that they are correctly labelling each and every one of the items!
These are just some of the highlights of our harrowing move with Suddath & United vanlines; or are they really Mayflower??? We are experienced movers, moving from one end of the country to the other numerous times and have never experienced such wanton negligence and carelessness as we did at the hands of these movers!
And guess what? We never did get a satisfaction survey to fill out! Is that just a coincidence? So instead, you get to hear about it! Our advice: run, don't walk, run as fast as you can from Suddath and United, and probably from Mayflower as well!
Mike
Northern, Virginia
U.S.A.
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1 Updates & Rebuttals
C. Michelle
Jacksonville,Florida,
U.S.A.
Response to Suddath Relocation Systems Grand Prairie Texas Complaint
#2UPDATE Employee
Tue, March 01, 2005
Suddath Relocation Systems of Texas, Inc.
1990 North Highway 360
Grand Prairie, TX 75050
(972) 660-5600
February 28, 2005
Dear Sir:
This letter is in response to the letter published on your website by Mr. Naveed Kahn on February 17, 2005. Mr. Kahn failed to provide all of the facts surrounding his move and we trust that you will post this rebuttal on your website.
Suddath Relocation Systems of Texas, Inc. (Suddath) is an agent of United Van Lines, LLC (United). Both United and its sister company, Mayflower Transit, LLC (Mayflower), are wholly owned subsidiaries of UniGroup, Inc.
In July 2004, Mr. Kahn hired Suddath to transport his goods from Texas to Virginia. As an agent of United, Suddath operates under United's interstate operating authority when providing interstate moving and relocation services. Mr. Kahn moved on very short notice during July, which is the busiest time of year in the moving industry. Thus, in order to ensure that a truck was available to transport Mr. Kahn's belongings, a Mayflower truck was assigned to transport the goods on Suddath/United's behalf. This was not a bait and switch, but a legitimate use of an affiliated company's equipment to ensure that Mr. Kahn's goods arrived on time.
We also take great issue with Mr. Kahn's statement that his goods were unloaded, placed in an unauthorized storage facility for the week, and then reloaded carelessly . . . While another customer's goods were likely on the same trailer and might have required some rearranging of the goods on the trailer, Suddath did not remove his goods from the trailer or place them in storage at any time. Mr. Kahn has no basis for his allegation.
Further, Mr. Kahn's statement that he was unsatisfied with the services provided by Suddath are without merit. A review of Suddath's file regarding Mr. Kahn's move indicates that Mr. Kahn's was extremely happy with the services provided. Specifically, on July 2, 2004, the day Mr. Kahn's goods were packed, he was contacted by a Suddath representative and Mr. Kahn advised that everything was going well and the crew was handling his belongings with care. (emphasis added). On July 3, 2004, the day Mr. Kahn's goods were loaded, he was again contacted by a Suddath representative and again Mr. Kahn advised that everything was moving along just fine and that the crew was doing a great job. (emphasis added). Finally, on July 13, 2004, the day Mr. Kahn's goods were delivered, he advised Suddath that he was very happy, everything was going very well, and the crew was doing a very good job.
Providing good customer service is of paramount importance to Suddath. This is demonstrated by the fact that, during a conversation with Mr. Kahn on July 13, 2004, he advised that there were scratches on some items. Federal law and the tariff under which both Suddath and United operate provides that a claim for damages must be submitted in writing. However, in the spirit of good faith, Suddath contacted a repair company to assess and repair the damage to Mr. Kahn's bedroom furniture on July 20, 2004, even though Mr. Kahn had not yet sent in the required claim form.
On July 29, 2004, Suddath contacted Mr. Kahn again and advised that his claim form had not yet been submitted. Without the claim form, Suddath did not know if Mr. Kahn had any additional claim issues and, as a result, was not in a position to settle the claim. Suddath finally received Mr. Kahn's claim form on August 16, 2004.
Part of Mr. Kahn's claim was for lost or missing items; however, there was no documentation to support Mr. Kahn's claim. At origin, the van operator inventoried each item and/or box that was loaded on the trailer and, when each box and/or item was unloaded from the truck, both Mr. Kahn and the driver checked it off on the inventory form. Mr. Kahn checked off the inventory at destination, but did not indicate that there were any missing items at that time. Further, there is a place on the bill of lading for a customer to take exceptions at destination (i.e. if items are not received, noticeable damage, etc.) Mr. Kahn did not make any exceptions on the bill of lading as to any loss or damage. Because the items Mr. Kahn claimed as missing were never listed on the inventory and he never made any exceptions on the bill of lading, there was no evidence that the alleged missing items were ever transported. Thus, Suddath/United did not reimburse Mr. Kahn for some of the claimed items because there was no record that they were included in the shipment. I wonder whether Mr. Kahn filed a police report regarding the alleged missing items or if he reported them to his homeowners' insurance company?
Aside from the lost or missing items that Mr. Kahn could not substantiate, Suddath and Mr. Kahn reached a settlement agreement with respect to the remainder of the claim. On October 15, 2004, Suddath forwarded a settlement check to Mr. Kahn as final settlement of this matter. In addition, Suddath authorized additional repairs to damaged items. However, because Mr. Kahn was out of the country for a period of time, the repairs were not completed until January 3, 2005. Mr. Kahn accepted Suddath/United's offer in full settlement of his claim for loss and damage and the claim has now been closed.
Contrary to Mr. Kahn's baseless allegations, Suddath is a reputable moving company. In fact, our reputation for quality and good customer service has been recognized through the various industry awards.
Suddath tries to provide the very best customer service for each customer. We take complaints very seriously and view them as an opportunity to improve our service when merited. However, as illustrated above, Mr. Kahn indicated to Suddath that his move went well and that there were no service issues other than some minor repairs which Suddath attempted to remedy as quickly as possible.
Since you published Mr. Kahn's version of the events, I hope that you will publish Suddath's version as Mr. Kahn's omissions are material and likely libelous. I look forward to your prompt response.
Very truly yours,
Richard Eschbacher, President
cc:
Joanna Aman, Esquire
Nancy O'Haugherty
Michelle Chance