I hired America's Moving Services for my relocation from Minnesota to California. During my initial phone conversation I told them that I needed to have my items picked up by Wednesday (at the very latest) of the week of my departure. They told me that would not be a problem. However, I received a phone call on Tuesday of that week to let me know that my stuff would not be picked up until Friday due to a previous customer filling up their truck. Therefore, I had to have a relative come to my place on Friday and wait for the movers to arrive. I was told that I would be given "compensation" for the inconvenience, but received nothing.
My items were dropped off on a Sunday evening. When I gave the mover my cashiers check as payment he refused to accept it. I told him that I was informed by my contact at America's Moving Service that cashiers checks were acceptable, but he refused to listen. He said he would only take cash. It being Sunday evening, my bank was not open. Therefore, my boyfriend and I both had to make trips to the nearest ATM to withdrawn enough cash to cover the expense while the mover waited with my things.
Additionally, upon arriving with my stuff, the mover told me that I was 400 pounds overweight. Because I stayed within my allotted amount of items, I was very skeptical of this. All of my boxes contained lightweight items (clothes, documents, etc.) so I didn't understand how I could have accumulated so much weight. However, he assured me that I was indeed 400 pounds overweight. As soon as he left, I weighed my boxes on a UPS provided scale that my boyfriend uses for his business. In total, my boxes weighed 820 pounds, not the 1,400 pounds claimed by the movers. I was shocked and angry, as I had paid an additional $260.00 in overweight charges!
Since this took place on Sunday evening, I had to wait until Monday to call my contact at America's Moving Services. He was polite, but told me that there was nothing he could do because I had waited too long to contact them. He said that I should have called on Sunday evening. According to them, calling on the very first business day after the event had occurred was not soon enough.
Furthermore, I did some research on Southwest Van Lines, the company that America's Moving Service contracted to move my items. It turns out that there is an overwhelming number of complaints of illegal and unethical activity by this moving company. In fact, when typing "Southwest Van Lines" into Google, the first couple of hits are from ripoffreport.com and movingscam.com This makes me wonder if America's Moving Service cares at all about the actions and business practices of the companies that they put in charge of people's personal belongings. I regret having used them for my move, and I'm very disappointed with the overall experience.
