CalState Moving

This was the worst and most damaging and traumatizing move I’ve ever had in over 30 years. I will NEVER USE this company again. Their lack of responsibility and care for my items is totally inexcusable. They also refuse to take responsibility for the issues after the fact once the damages were reported.

These guys are clearly green and inexperienced aside from being so unfriendly, uncooperative and borderline defensive. They were ignoring clearly marked items that had to be with a certain top facing up and turned my hutch completely upside down and all of the things inside got smashed. When I pointed it out to them or told them they dinged my door they didn't seem to care either way. They just kind of shrugged and kept doing what they were doing. Doors and walls got banged into and they left behind a huge mess of debris all down the hallway which I had to ask them to clean up and then I still had to go down and continue to clean after they left.

I kept telling them to put the items that were marked for the kitchen in the kitchen and the items that were marked for the bedroom in the bedroom etc. and they ignored me and kept placing things in areas where the big furniture was going to go so it ended up taking a lot more time than it would have had they been properly trained and efficient and know what they were doing. We had to keep having them move things over and over again because they kept putting things in the wrong area and then we couldn't put the furniture where it was going to go. They also would not remove shrinkwrap and things of that nature until I asked them multiple times. Alex was the only one who was making an effort in trying to help out with those things and the rest of the guys could care less. Overall I would say about an hour got wasted because of the way they handled everything. I was talked into hiring 4 guys because they could do things in pairs and go faster according to Jeff: but, that is not what happened. I feel that I should have had three guys not for because sometimes I would just see one guy hanging out and waiting while the other three were doing the work.

My bed that’s a little over a year old was so badly damaged that although I was able to get it repaired enough to use now, it won’t survive being taken apart and moved again. When I placed the order with Jeff I specifically said I would need somebody to put my bed together and he said no problem. When I mentioned it to the guys they said that they don't do that and so I hired an outside guy to come (which is ridiculous in and of itself). When we got to the room so that the outside guy I hired could do at one of the guys had already started putting it together and he clearly did not know what he was doing and could not figure out how to put the ends together and he ruined my bed.

One of the guys asked to drive with me from the storage facility to the apartment which was from Los Angeles to San Diego North County which is actually north of San Diego. The drive took us about an hour and a half and normally would take about an hour and 45 minutes maybe two hours tops. They charged me for three hours of drive time and since that was doubled I was charged for six hours when it's clear they must have stopped somewhere to grab lunch since it took them an hour and 15 minutes longer than us to get there. That cost me an extra $310 which is ludicrous. I refused to sign the paper saying that all of my items were arrived in good shape because of the way I saw them treating my items and I'm so glad I did not sign the paper because I found so many issues once I was able to unpack and take a look at everything. It’s insane that they want you to sign something saying all of your things arrived in good shape when you can’t look at everything until you unpack since boxes are in the way and things are hidden.
I was feeling so exhausted and overwhelmed by the end of the move and quite frankly a little intimidated by them because they were so intense to deal with. Even the people I had at the apartment to help me unpack were totally appalled at the way there were behaving and how inept they were and said something to me about it after they left.
I've never left a bad review or report to anybody about a service in my life but this experience has left such a bad taste in my mouth that I don't feel good not saying or doing something about it. It's not acceptable for this to go unaddressed. At the end of the day, the loss was over $800 for me and they offered me $250 and some more attitude to go with it. I don’t know what happened to the days of customer service but this company was horrible to deal with and I will never use them again!

Move size: 2 Bedroom Home Service cost: $1650

As many folks out there realize, it’s tough to find a good moving company these days.

Cal State came through for us as we needed to move relatively quickly since my wife needed to start a new job in LA last month.

The closing on the sale of our condo in San Francisco came soon we than we expected.

The moving team came prepared and wore protective gear throughout the moving process.

Everything was ha does with great care and there were no delays with pickup or delivery.

Really great value for the price charged. Recommend.

Move size: 2 Bedroom Home Service cost: $5500

We moved from CA to TN on 05/31/20. I spoke with Joe that gave a pretty reasonable quote and after calling a few places I decided to go with this company. This company provided the worst moving service that I have ever experienced. I have heard horror stories about people getting a quote and then the day the movers show up it’s a much greater amount than originally quoted. In order to not have this happen to us I went room by room and wrote down every single item that would need to be moved and even included measurements on some items. In the end we had more boxes than I thought we would have so I expected around $500 more for the extra boxes. When the movers showed up and started going through the inventory I was told by Hendrix (lead mover) that we had double what was quoted and that we would be using a full truck rather than half a truck. When the movers get your stuff they use a 26ft moving truck and shuttle it to the semi. I informed him that I have an incredibly detailed inventory and even provided measurements so that this would not happen and his response was that the guys giving the estimate don’t know. Hendrix also doesn’t like to be questioned and will get aggressive and talk over you when you’re trying to ask valid questions. When I pointed out that the biggest items was our bed and 3 piece sectional he stated that the sectional could not be on its side, could not be stacked, and could not have boxes placed on top of it and that’s the reason for the excess room beyond what was originally quoted. He also said with our elliptical that nothing could be placed on top of it. We were scheduled to leave that day so we agreed to pay the higher price. Hendrix also tried to say they were charging extra for “back breaking” items. The back breaking items he was referring to was a washer, a refrigerator, and our mattress. He wanted to charge an additional $600 for those items and they are nothing more than regular standard size items. We asked him to show where this was in the contract and he then removed the extra charge.Throughout the process of them loading I was in contact with Joe who kept texting me and saying what they are doing is unethical and they’re not loading stuff properly. After 7 long hours the truck was loaded. I messaged a couple of days after the truck was loaded to get an approximate arrival date of our stuff and was told by Joe that dispatch wasn’t calling him back and here’s their number. I called dispatch and was told our stuff was still in CA and the date is was due to be loaded on the semi. When I was notified by Melissa that it was loaded I asked what the approximate date for arrival was and was told the driver would call and if I haven’t heard from the driver in a few days to reach out. Some days pass and I reach out to Melissa again who cannot be bothered to message back and this goes on for a few days before she finally messages back. The driver contacts us via text and stated he’ll be there on 6/15 between 2-4 and informed me if the balance and stated anything more than 150lbs is an extra charge and that if they have to carry items more than 50 feet it’s an extra charge. I wrote back stating the contract mentions nothing of the 150lbs and that it’s 75ft not 50ft. He just messaged back..ok thanks. 6/15 comes and it’s about 4:30-4:45 and I have heard nothing from the driver so I message to make sure he’s coming and he says he’ll be there in an hour. Our stuff finally arrives and they open the side door where they’re going to unload our stuff and I notice the semi trailer is not even 1/3rd full of our stuff. Hendrix when he loaded said we had a 26ft moving truck full, couches could not be stacked on the side or each other and no boxes on the couch, and nothing on the elliptical. The semi trailer used was 53 feet so if we had a 26ft moving truck full then our stuff should take up at least half the semi trailer and it was no where close to that. We also noticed stuff stacked on the elliptical, couches on their side and boxes on the couches. My husband and I took numerous pictures and even measurements of the truck and calculated the actual square footage of the amount used in the semi. Hendrix said we used 1948 cubic feet when in reality it was 1196. They overcharged is by $3948! I also asked the truck driver for the manifest showing how much space our stuff took up and he stated that he didn’t have a manifest. When I questioned him about the manifest and mentioned they’re required by law to carry one he backtracked and said oh no it’s by weight so the driver had no desire to cooperate either. When I sent pics to Melissa and Joe demanding my money back Melissa didn’t bother to respond and Joe said he would pass the info along and I’d probably get a phone call from CalState. I have yet to receive any call so our next step is pursuing legal action since they do not want to cooperate. I would strongly discourage anyone from using this company as they have incredibly deceptive practices.

Move size: 3 Bedroom Home Service cost: $9920

This company called me when I was searching for a moving company. I did a walk-through in my house with their rep on the phone and I provided descriptions and measurements of each piece of furniture, along with photos of the larger items. After giving them all of the measurements, the rep told me that the cubic square footage, along with approx 100 boxes, came out to 1,741 cubic feet and the rep gave me a quote of $7,300 to move from Calif to Colorado. This was higher than other companies I had talked to, but I thought that since they gathered specific details of the items, it was going to be an accurate quote.

When they showed up on moving day with a small box truck, we knew we had been had. The foreman said that he could order another truck, but it would cost an additional $3,300. We refused the additional truck and just told them to take what they could fit and we would deal with the rest. They were only able to take about half of our furniture and no boxes or other items. After the truck was full, the foreman approached me with documents to sign that showed an additional $3,100 charge for "bulky items." I refused to sign and my husband videotaped the encounter because we knew they were trying to pull a scam.

Our furniture was delivered to Colorado and about half of everything delivered was severely damaged. Broken glass shelves, broken table top, another table top with a deep gouge that cannot be repaired, the top of our armiore was completely broken in half, and many other items that were in very bad shape. They disassembled some of our furniture at our old house, but only reassembled about half of it at our new house. Most of the hardware was missing and we had to buy new hardware and put our furniture back together ourselves, even though we paid for reassembly.

All in all, it was a nightmare. I have sent emails to the company requesting a claim form for the damaged items along with a request for a refund for the services that were not rendered. As I expected though, I am being ignored.

I highly discourage anyone to use this company.

Move size: 2 Bedroom Home Service cost: $7300

I have a really long story to share, but in the interest of your time, I will simply post my email to Tony (who calls himself "John" too) after he cancelled on me 4 days before my move which was the weekend in summer (busy moving time)..

"I booked on June 19 directly with your company.

On June 20, you called me to confirm and to ask me to move my move time to the morning, which I accommodated for you.

On June 20th, you had obviously seen my address since YOU called to start the move earlier that day. Yet you waited until June 25 to, first, call me and say sorry that your receptionist messed up by booking this move and should not have booked a move so far away, but you would still honor the reservation as it was YOUR error. Then, not even 2 hours later, you TEXT ME that you are cancelling due to not doing moves in Ventura. This is all unacceptable and your text was chicken [EDIT].

I called you and you asked me to pay for a 4th hour so you could still do the move. Yes, I refused to pay for more time than I need. You either rectify your error or not.

I would like the $100 refunded to my credit card immediately. I will certainly make sure that other people know about your lack of customer service and consideration. The correct thing to have done would be to pay the 4th hour of "minimum" time yourself or to waive it as all of this was your error and there is no way for me to find a weekend mover that is not double the price at this short notice."

After my email, Tony/John kept responding to me like a 10-year old with lies and excuses. I will give him credit for refunding the $100 deposit the same day he told me they were flaking out on me, but then again, no mover I have ever used asked me for a deposit to move to begin with.

Tony/John's number is 347-220-8550. He will also send you unprofessional texts after you book to change your move time and call you to say that his movers are energetic in the early morning, but not so much in the afternoon.

Move size: 1 Bedroom Home Service cost: $255

Calstate Moving & Storage sent false and predatory advertisements to lock in our sale. They offered a discount and faster delivery service as part of a "piggy back move" because they were already completing a move in that direction, however they failed to meet our drop off day by several weeks. They said only a $200 deposit was required to secure the move, but then 2 days before pickup was scheduled they demanded a 30% deposit even though more than 50% was due at pickup anyway. They refused to come to our home to give us an estimate, so I recorded a very detailed video of all the stairs and belongings for them to provide an accurate estimate. They offered a binding estimate of $4490 but when they arrived for pickup told us it would be $6000. They offered auto transport for $1050 which we agreed to on our contract, but once we gave them the deposit they told us the car transport was actually with a different company, Experienced Auto Transport, who missed our pickup window by several days and charged us $1400. Once they failed to meet our drop off date by 1 week, they requested an additional $600 for expedited shipping. The day before drop off finally arrived (21 days after pick up) the driver claimed it would cost around $1000 extra to shuttle our goods because he didn't think the semi truck would fit down a huge street with a large parking lot and school directly in front of us. We had about $1000 worth of damages to large furniture which was not packed properly. Not all items were labelled with numbered stickers making it incredibly difficult to mark inventory of our shipment. Calstate Moving & Storage locked us in with low prices and attempted to up-charge us every step of the way.

Move size: 2 Bedroom Home Service cost: $5490

I strongly believe that all of this was well planned, it makes perfect sense and is pretty smart if you think about it, Colonial Moving & Storage if a Broker so what they do is cold call you using information they obtain from U-Haul, Penske & Budget Rentals (we know this because those were the 1st three we called before talking with Colonial. So, they get your info, make contact and give you a price significantly lower than quoted by the moving companies. They then have you pay a deposit then sell you contract to another company, obviously they are all working together and know this. Calstate Moving & Storage, Hermes Moving and Storage& Cross-Country Movers in our case. Calstate then controls the contract and uses its other businesses as sort of buffers, if the other businesses get in trouble, fines or complained on they can always just Do Business As (DBA) with a new name. Now instead of having to complain on one company in one state your dealing with 4 (or more) companies in 2 different states. Now it becomes difficult to file a complaint of a law suit.

Here is what we have done and are doing. We contacted the Better Business Bureau who gave us an amazing amount of information and insight. We filed a complaint with them on Calstate Moving & Storage, Hermes Moving and Storage & Colonial Moving & Storage. We contacted & filed a complaint with the Department of Transportation in California, New Mexico & Florida. I contacted & filed a complaint with the Federal Department of Transportation and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration. We contacted and filed a complaint with the California Public Utilities Commission, the California Whistleblowers Association and the California State Attorney Generals Office. We contacted and filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission (who put our names on a list for a class action law suit) and Immigration Customs Enforcement. Every where we called to complain were very helpful and gave us insight into contacting another agency that might be able to help. We are also in the process of posting complaints to My Moving Reviews, BBB, Yelp, Google & Yahoo Reviews so that no on else ever gets scammed like us.

Hermes Moving & Storage – (Emily & Tony – Customer Service Reps.)

6033 Barton Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90038

Calstate Moving & Storage – (Augustine & Melissa – Managers or Customer Service Reps.)

3203 Boaz st, Los Angeles CA 90011

Colonial Moving & Storage – (Steve Roth – Sales Rep., Tammy – Accounting, Amanda – Operations Manager, Sarah Drumand – Unknown, Jessica McBride – Unknown)

2016 S 10th street Suite A Ft. Pierce, FL 34950.

Move size: 2 Bedroom Home Service cost: $1700

Move from California to Chicago.

Initial quote at $1700, they said 'not even half of the 300 cft' were taken. This is the reason I chose them vs other companies who were asking for more. No on-premise visit, no video were asked for the estimation.

A first deposit of around $700 was paid to secure the move. No time of arrival was given at this time. They said they were a carrier, not a broker, and that the move would take 7 to 10 days.

5 days before the move, an updated inventory was made, bringing me this time to $3000. Still no pick up time estimate provided. A second deposit of around $600 had to be made to complete the first one. This surcharge was charged twice on my bank account.

The day before the move, I was informed that the pick up truck would come between 9am and 11am.

On the pick up day, I did not receive any information before 12:30pm, when the driver called me to say he was late. They arrived at 2pm, in a Budget truck (not a branded one).

On arrival, they said we had to pay more than $600 more than what was agreed upon, to account for additional spaced and packaging, bringing my total to $3620. Apart from that, pickup was ok, the 2 guys were ok, and I tipped them for the service. At this point, no estimated arrival date was provided.

I was able to pay the pick up fee ($1150, same due upon delivery) by card, but found out about the double charge, so I disputed it and waited for it to be reaccredited to my account before paying the pick up fee. My belongings did not move before I paid, which took multiple days. Colonial was impossible to get ahold on the phone, I had to go through their carrier and mention the Better Business Bureau to get a quick answer, as well as a refund.

I was not able to get an update on my belongings arrival before only 5 days before the date, which was 12 days after the pick up date. And even then, I only knew that 'my stuff was on the move', with no estimation whatsoever of the time it would take to arrive at destination. I thus had to be in an empty apartment for more than a week, just in case.

2 days before the delivery date, the driver called me to say there would be an additional fee for using a different truck to deliver my belongings, which I had no way of anticipating. The fee was $450.

The delivery was on time and went well, the guys knew what they were doing. My belongings were globally ok, with a few things broken, and minor damage (broken plates, dents, ..).

Total charge: $4070 (+139% of the agreed upon price initially).

Overall, this was a very stressful, time consuming, and expensive experience that I do not wish to anyone. There were 4 different companies involved in this move, that I still to this day don't know to what extent they were involved:

- COLONIAL MOVING & STORAGE LLC (Broker and scammer)

- Dimbas LLC (pick-up guys, and intermediates for the next steps)

- CalState Moving & Storage (dispatch?)

- IGN Global Inc. (actual carrier)

All were quite hard to contact, and the responsibilities were not made clear from the start, which added to the general confusion and scam-impression.

Move size: 2 Bedroom Home Service cost: $4070

Its horrible! They lie! It's almost 1 year and they have not called me back to reimburse an amount that was charged for an item they never picked up, I was missing almost half of my items, I even recieved stuff that were not mine, and I gave it back to then immediately, but up to today my items are still missing. CAL STATE MOVING COMPANY has no dignity, they just want your money. Hire a different company unless you want items to be missing and getting over charge with their prices!

Move size: 3 Bedroom Home Service cost: $7000