Great American Vanlines MegaRelocation Was given an estimate cost based on specific items but ended up being charged almost doubled. Was lied to about tolls and cancellation fee and delivery date. New Jersey

I read some reviews at yp.com and thought I would cancel Moving USA which had an overall one star review and changed to great American which had a 5 star review at that forum even if I had to pay more.   It turned out that they were no different.  Later on, I checked the BBB site and found that they have an F rating.

 

I first sent a list of items I wanted moved to them and they came back with an estimate of $1350.  I asked specifically whether there would be surprises, whether there would be an increase.  Nathan assured me that there would not be because the list was so specific down to the number of sections of the sofa, etc.  He also assured me that the shipment would arrive on Friday, 3 days after pick up, and that David did not know about the schedules when he told me that it would not get there until much later..

 

In any case, Jose arrived with two other guys on Tuesday, the first thing he said that from his experience, my stuffs would be something like 750 cubic feet and not 425 cubic feet like Nathan had estimated.  He also said I would have to pay the tolls for coming to pick up and it will be $94.  I live in CT and they came in from NJ.  I said where were the tolls and how much at each?  He said the GW was $38 and some other places adding up to $47.  Then he doubled it for going back.  I said there were no tolls going back out.  He tried to tell me that it was different for trucks than cars and since that made no sense even for morons, he finally cut down the tolls charged to $54.  Then when I said that if the shipment was going to cost almost twice as much as the estimate, I don't have to ship it.  He then showed me some place on his paper that said if there is a cancellation, they could charge me 20% of the shipment cost.  He said something like $400.  What I did not realize was that this cancellation fee can only apply only if you had signed the service order with them which I had not.  I merely had obtained a non-binding estimate.

 

I ended up leaving out a lot of items from the list, still the shipment came out according to their cubic feet estimate to be $1864.  The curious thing now was that he said he could make part of this into tips for the guys and himself.  So I paid $264 in cash and he wrote a binding estimate for $1600.

What I wish I had read beforehand was the little booklet by the Department of Transportation that he kept until the end to give me.  All moving companies are required by law to give out this booklet to the customers to help them know about their rights.  I leaned after the fact that I did not have to pay the 20 percent cancellation fee unless I had signed the service order which I did not sign until that day.  I learned that with a non-binding estimate, I have the right to pay no more than 110 percent of that for them to release the goods to me, that with a non-binding estimate, they would have to weigh my shipment and charge according to the weight.  Jose had me sign the binding estimate for $1600 that day so with that they no longer had to weigh the shipment and charged me based on cubic feet instead.  All of these I did not know.  Before Jose got to load, I tried calling Nathan to ask why his estimate was so far off, of course his direct line that used to be answered promptly was no longer answered.  The company's line was answered by a woman who told me to contact the dispatcher, Jason or David, who also did not answer.  The pattern is clear--they answer the phone prior to getting your business and once that's done, they stop answering.  Messages are not returned either.

In the final analysis, I ended up paying twice as much as the estimate since I left out almost a third of the shipment and still ended paying close to $2000  compared to the estimate of $1350 for everything.

 

The booklet can be read online and it is a must read before you move, not after.

https://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/protect-your-move