Dishonesty, cutting corners and mid-night service
Cristina
Submitted this review about
Victory Van Lines
Review made Live: 5/15/2010 12:08:00 PM
We were connected to this company through Nationwide Relocation Services (a.k.a. Moving Cost), for the move of a two-bedroom apartment. The binding estimate was originally $1945 for the inventory I provided. We ended up paying $4306.97. We were reimbursed $412 (see below). Moving Cost is reviewed separately. There are three major problems we had that potential customers should be aware of regarding Victory Van Lines.
1) They determine the cost of the move by the weight of the cargo. Unless the costumer observes for himself that the movers weighed the cargo properly, the weight will be determined at their warehouse in Rockeville, MD. In our case, they inflated the weight by over 800 pounds and charged us fees accordingly. Based on the weight tickets that they are required to file, they used a truck for the truck-minus-cargo that was not the same as the one that carried our cargo. Their method for determination of weight is in violation of federal law. Since we were certain that they were incorrect in determining the weight, we asked them them re-weigh our truck with us presnet to observe the process. They offered us a $200 discount to avoid having to do this. We declined. We had to drive 100 miles two times to a weigh station to verify that this truck was weighed properly and collect the weight tickets. By doing this, we were able to determine that they were off the weight estimate by over 800 lbs. They reimbursed $412.80 with no apologies.
2) The company hires people who are friendly but inexperienced and don't speak english well enough to communicate properly. They performed both our pick-up and delivery after 12AM and 8PM, respectively, despite our numerous warnings that are apartment complexes restrict moving in and out to before 9PM. As a result, at delivery, we had to help them carry our things as quickly as possible to avoid violation of our lease, and we ended up assembling our own furniture, even though the company was paid to do this for us. At pick-up, we were charged nearly $400 for extra packing, which included labor and packing materials. Much of the packing was done using our own packing materials. We were charged for these materials! We were also charged $127 fee for " 100+ft long-walk" for a walk that was less than 100 ft. We measured it ourselves. They refused to correspond with us regarding these matters.
3) At pick-up, there were forms that implied these extras fees may be forthcoming. My signature was required on these forms, but I never signed them. My signature was forged on these forms by a mover named Phillip. I received no notice of these extra fees until they had our cargo out of our site.
