FINEST MOVERS: WORST COMPANY, SCAMS, BROKEN ITEMS, PRICE GOUGING, THREATS
Craig Orvieto
Submitted this review about
Finest Movers
Review made Live: 7/14/2013 5:18:00 PM
Their name is a farce as they are clearly not the finest movers. They are a scam and run a "bait and switch" game with you along with threats.
They operate out of 2 different office locations, but the phone number (1-800-234-5731) is the same for both.
The website has this address: 16850-112 Collins Avenue, Sunny Isles, Florida 33160
The paperwork has this address: 2525 Park Lane, Hallandale, Florida 33009
Here is our story:
My wife and I were moving to New York City from Tampa, Florida with a scheduled pickup date of July 3, 2013. We had a "binding estimate" from Alex Harmon at Finest Movers for $1889.00. We paid a 20% deposit via online check and thought everything was ready to go. We even called a few days prior and spoke to Ryan at Finest Movers and let him know we had a few less boxes, but a few more wardrobe boxes. He said "that wont be a problem since they aren't unsual shape".
On the day of the mover, the mover's got to our apartment almost 3 hours late. The actual mover's did a good job in terms of the speed they worked getting our items packed. The foreman mentioned to my wife that the estiamte the company gave was "really low" and that the cost was going to be much more. After packing all of our items into the truck, the foreman shows my wife that now the cost was going to be $5270 and 50% of that amount is due immediately. We were unable to contact Finest Movers that night since they were closed by the time the movers finished loading the truck. My wife was forced to pay $2446.50 that night.
On July 5, my wife contacted Finest Movers and asked to speak to a manager. She kept getting transfered to a voicemail, where she left multiple messages. No one ever called her back. On Monday July 8th, she spoke to Ciara multiple times regarding the situation. She said she would look into it. She never did. She promised to call her back, which she never did.
July 9th is when things turn a further turn for the worse.
On July 9th, she called Finest Movers and was eventually transferred to Clifford Michaels, the general manager. She proceeded to explain the situation to Mr. Michaels, who then said he would give us a $400.00 discount. My wife then asked him "Do you think that is a fair amount?" Mr. Michaels responded with "Fuck that, we're going to put a lien on all your stuff and sell it at auction" and hung up on her. My wife called back, and after being hung up on multiple (at least 4) times, finally got in touch with Ciara again. Ciara told her that in order to have our stuff delivered, we would have to send them an email or fax stating that we promise to pay the remaining amount in cash or postal order only. They had our stuff, what were we supposed to do? We sent the email to them and got a confirmation email stating the items would be delivered.
The night prior to delivery, the driver called us saying they would need to use a seperate truck for the delivery that would cost us an additional $550, which had to be paid in cash. Delivery was scheduled for July 12, 2013 They subcontracted the delivery to another company. The driver of this company stated that the truck was all packed when he went to pick it up. When he attempted to deliver our items, not only was my wife and her friend in shock, but so to were the deliverymen. Most of the boxes were severely damaged by water and physical damage (see pictures). One of our TVs was missing as well as one of our boxes (they had to make a second delivery sunday July 14th with the TV and box). Much of the furniture was damaged. Our form fitted mattress was loaded and stored incorrectly and now is all misshapen. The delivery man wrote was so shocked that he wrote us a letter with this information as well.
We called Finest Movers on July 12, 2013 while the delivery was happening. I spoke to both Crystal and Elyse and explained what was happening. They told me their managers were in a meeting and one would call me when they finished. We have yet to hear from their manager, Leah Roberts (ext 103) or the general manager Clifford Michaels (ext 102).
We will continue to contact them and see if they will honor their "100% satisfaction guarantee" that is posted on their website. However, this guarantee was mentioned to Mr. Michaels when my wife spoke to him initially when he hung up on her, so we doubt we will get the 100% satisfaction guarantee.
