Lessons learned from my recent long distance 27,000lbs full truck to new state

Long Distance Out-Of-State Move

I just finished a 27k, full truck move from TX to PA and wanted to share some lessons learned.

This was my 6th professional move and was the worst move with the most problems of all of them.

I think a big part of what went wrong was my own complacency.

My last 2 moves were with Allied, the one before that United, and then I had 2 that I honestly can't remember which company.

But all of them were very good...and easy.

I think that because my previous moves have been relatively good that I was lulled into a false sense of security and assumed as long as I was using a carrier and not a broker this one would be fine.

Since I had never used this company before I should have done more due diligence.

I wanted to share the things that I could have done better to maybe prevent some of this.

I hope this helps someone:

• First and foremost for me....ask questions about exactly what the claim process is and how your things are valued. If your leather sofa gets damaged do they replace it, or repair it? Do they depreciate it? how is the value determined? And if there is a value per pound...run away. You definitely do not want to find that your $4,000 treadmill that is damaged only has a claim value of $120 because the value limit is 60 cents a pound and it weighs 200 pounds.

  • If your move value is not the same as your homeowners goods value ask a lot of questions.

  • How long do you have to file claims?

  • What is the claim process?

  • For me, I am looking for them to repair furniture. I prefer that over payment. Scratches happen, a professional restoration company can fix it so you will never tell. This is the best situation IMO.

  • If you do not have replacement value, make sure you know what the up charge will be. And make sure you read the valuation in the contract.....don't just take the salesman's word that you can file a claim if items are damage. Understand what the dollar value of that claim is.

    • Caveat...of 6 moves, I have had 0 claims on 3. And the other 3 were very minimal. However, there are lots of horror stories out there

• Ask for your move coordinator's cell phone. If they will not give it to you, ask how to get in touch on weekends and nights. This for me is a red flag. When the movers are scheduled to arrive on a Sunday and don't show I want to know exactly how to get in touch with someone. I would also test this out to ensure you can get in touch.

• Ask what happens if your things will not fit on the truck. You don't want to be a day before closing and find out they didn't pack it right or underestimated and it will take a week to get another truck scheduled.

  • Make sure you understand the scope of your move. Are they moving a certain weight? a certain volume, or everything you own no matter what it takes?

• Ask if the crew goes with the truck or if local crews are used. I have seen it done both ways and it was great having the same guys that loaded unload 1400 miles away. That was in 2018 and 2020 so not sure if that is still a thing, but sure was nice when I had that.

• If they are using local crews ask them who the company that is doing the loading and unloading is, have they worked with them before and have they ever had a problem with them?

  • Ask them what happens if the loaders or unloaders don't show. Is there a back up plan? If so what is it. Trust me when I say if you have a 27,000 pound move and the unloaders do not show you and your driver are going to have a very, very long and unpleasant day.

    • I would also be very clear on what happens in a similar case in terms of hours of unloading. Will they do a 14 hour day or will they stretch to two days?

• Make sure you understand exactly what the loading and unloading windows are. If they give you a loading date of the 11th and 12th, will it happen on those dates? or is there leeway.

  • I would also understand very clearly how many days for packing, loading and unloading. If they tell you it is 4 days, will it be 4 days? Or could it be two days with a bigger crew?

    • This is a personal preference. The advantage to doing it in two days is less disruption in your life. The disadvantage is that IMO it's hard to do it right with a lot of people in a short time.

• Ask exactly how they inventory your items. Is every item and box tagged and logged? Again, this is a very, very important item to ensure you get your things. I would make sure this is spelled out in the contract. If your move coordinator tells you that is how it is done make sure that your contract says that and you don't have a driver showing up asking you to sign an inventory before it is loaded.

• Also ask how they pack, and what the course of action is if you feel they are not packing things correctly

  • It isn't that movers want to damage your things. But time is money. When I was in college I worked at a certain package delivery company that uses brown trucks. My first day loading I was trying to load packages following this end up markings etc. The center manager told me to ignore those markings, that it was cheaper to pay claims than to slow down. This has always stuck with me and I believe applies to moving.

    • I have found that having snacks and drinks ready when the movers arrive, bringing in lunch and generally treating them with respect goes a long way to their cooperation with you and you can ask them for special treatment packing certain things. But what happens when they don't schedule enough time?

• I take the things I know I would like first out of the truck to start using (e.g. coffee maker) and put them in one area and ask them to pack together and hold back if you can. Marking those boxes with masking tape also makes it easy to identify on the unload end....see a box with blue painters tape on it....grab that because it has important things. It helps get to some normalcy on the other end without having to empty a ton of boxes.

• On third party services make sure you ask what happens if there is a problem, and who is responsible for the quote. In other words, if your moving company arranges crating or disassembly of equipment and the bid is wrong, are you responsible, or are they? Again, you don't want to pay up front for a service that your mover arranged and quoted, only to have the third party ask you for an additional $1300 on the spot or leaving. And if this does happen you want to make sure you are not responsible, that the mover is.

  • If you are responsible, then I would confirm the quote with the third party company to ensure 100% the scope they were asked to quote is correct.

  • Ask your mover what happens if the third party leaves without completing their task due to a quote issue.

  • This is an item I would be really hesitant to let a mover quote virtually. Or get it guaranteed. Crating is expensive so its important the sizes are right.

• Be very clear on every line item on the quote whether it is firm or estimated. The worst thing that happens is when the movers show up they try to up charge for any of the already priced items.

• The best helpful hint of all is that after all the paper work is done, how you treat the people doing the work is a very key item. Treat them well and they will make little exceptions for you that matter.