Poor Service By AmeLi Moving
Shawn
Submitted this review about
AmeLi Moving
Review made Live: 11/11/2007 8:44:00 PM
On 5/26/07 my family relocated from Costa Mesa, CA to Mission Viejo, CA, a move of approximately 20 miles. In
the weeks leading up to the move I had researched several different moving companies and decided to go with Ameli Moving. Ameli was local; their rates were reasonable and according to the booking agent that the packing materials were included at no additional charge. The paperwork sent to us led us to believe this was an all-inclusive contract. There was no mention any where of a gas charge or an additional charge for ‘bulky items’, no price list of any kind and the booking agent had already stated there would be no charge for the little extra packing materials we might need.
The two movers came to our 1 bedroom apartment around 9:15am on Saturday, 5/26/07. First we had to sign many additional papers in a rushed manor and it was difficult to understand the movers’ explanation of each document because of the strong accent and language problems. It seemed that most documents had to do with insurance. I signed them without fully reading them due to the time constraints of the move. I had not received the papers before hand and now we were on the clock having to read and sign.
My wife and I had spent the previous week packing and transporting most of the smaller items including small boxes all our clothing. The only large items that were left for transport were:
A standard sized couch
A love seat
A pressboard entertainment center –no shelves (6’ tall, 6’long and 18” deep)
A large pressboard bookcase- no shelves (6’ tall, 6’ long and 16” deep)
A small bookcase – no shelves
A round dinning table (with 6 chairs)
A small side table
A standard queen sized bed (bed frame, matrices and box springs)
A headboard with two towers on each end (detachable)
A writing desk
A four-drawer tower dresser
A standard dressing table with mirror
2 two-drawer filing cabinets
6 lamps
and miscellaneous cardboard boxes
My 6 months pregnant wife went to stay near the moving truck to insure they didn’t receive a ticket as things were being loaded. The movers decided they wanted to take out the entertainment center first. The entertainment center is a fairly industry standard with glass doors. The shelving had already been removed. The movers moved the entertainment center out the front door and tried to bring it down stairs. They decided they could not and it might be easier if they removed the glass doors. I have moved the unit several times in the past, never did they have to take the doors off it. The movers brought the entertainment center back inside again and one of the went down stairs to get a screwdriver from their truck.(empty handed) I had a full tool box with tools right there. All they had to do is ask, but since they only spoke in Russian and only to each other I didn’t understand the problem. Once they took off the glass panels, they decided to get more blankets for packing. Again a mover went down to the truck to get blankets (‘packing material’ we were charged for) He did not take any articles with him either in his hands or on his hand truck. With my help we were finally able to get the entertainment center down the stairs. To move this one piece, took close to one full hour. The movers had been onsite for almost a full hour before one single item was moved to the truck.
During this time, my pregnant wife who had been staying near the truck became worried. After almost an hour had passed and having seen the mover return to the truck several times empty handed for various things, she came back to the apartment and started to help carry what items she could to the truck to speed things along. I was also carrying smaller items to the truck (lamps, chairs, etc…), while the movers worked with the larger things. There was a lot of arguing between them in a second language. Had I understood what they needed, I could have better helped, but it just turned into confusion. Between the four of us, took over 2.5 hours to get everything loaded in the truck. The movers worked at a very leisurely, unhurried pace with a lot of discord between them as to how to go about the move. In the second hour, one of the movers stated that because the apartment was located on the second floor, that the stairs were ‘killing’ him. As a hired professional mover (his chosen profession), it would seem that he should have been accustomed to stairs and have the physical ability to negotiate them with ease.
When we arrived at our new home it was the same story, with more yelling and arguing. I personally unloaded the bed frame from the truck. It took both of them to unload the box springs, and carry it to my new home. It had already been predetermined exactly where each article of furniture would be placed in the house so as to not waste time. The movers and myself moved most of the other articles from the truck then took a break before going for the final item, the entertainment center, which was fine. However, it took them 1 1/2 to unload 1 bedroom’s worth of furniture that was already packed. Some of the furniture ended up with areas of damage because the movers were unable to maneuver the items and turn them in such a way that they would fit through the doors and staircases.
After the move was complete one of them asked for time to calculate the bill. He presented me a bill of $770.00 if we paid in cash or $825.00 if we charged. I could not believe what I saw. This was twice they amount that I thought it was going to be having based my price on the quote I was given: the hourly rate (I had suspected there might be a charge, but had not been provided a statement saying how much) Of course the rate I had been quoted didn’t include the charges for packing materials and ‘bulky items’. From what I was given in the estimates the most I figured to pay was $400.00. We had no idea of the extra charges for packing material (blankets) and ‘bulky items’. What is a bulky item? No mention of this charge had ever been said and no list was ever provided as to what was considered ‘bulky’. We had only a small 1-bedroom apartment with the standard furniture. I tried to talk to him and was given shakes of the head. I asked him to leave my home and that I wanted to talk to a supervisor. I called Ameli @ 866-300-1299 and no one was there (they had left early because of the holiday weekend). I called 866-355-8565 with the same results. There was talk of calling the police, but in the end, because my wife has completions with the pregnancy and cannot be under much stress and also because I felt physically threatened and feared for the life of my unborn child, I paid him off.
What was disclosed to me and helped directed my decision to use Ameli to move my family was not the service that was provided. There were hidden charges such like packing materials. The movers didn’t even wrap the couch cushions to couch to move them. The blankets that were used between articles in the moving truck were not purchased; they were part of the standard packing. The moves that were sent, didn’t have a sense of urgency or organization and returned to their truck several times empty handed when they could have taken items with them and the documents that I had to rush to sign at their arrival should have been provided well in advance so I could know what they were. I didn’t even receive a copy of those documents. Several of the items of wood furniture suffered scrape and grooves because the movers seemed unable to manipulate them so they would fit through the tight spaces.
