Corrigan Moving Systems

We chose Corrigan because it was $2,000 cheaper than the competitors, and we had a good experience with them long ago. This time we used them to move across the country to Washington. The sales pitch sounded great; the experience has been terrible. The moving truck broke down two times, arriving two weeks after they packed up, leaving us camping in our house and eating out for days on end. The response from the company was that this was "just bad luck." Clearly, their fleet was not in good repair.

What is even more deeply frustrating was the state of our possessions when they finally arrived. One of the movers loaded our generator with gas still in it (marking it had been emptied). This tipped over en route, and our entire new house now smells like a garage. The gas fumes are caustic in some parts. Upholstered furniture was supposed to be shrink wrapped; it was not, so these items, including a new sofa, especially soaked up the gasoline smell. A mattress had grease marks on it. Some furniture was scratched and poorly wrapped. My professional file box with all of my work papers apparently was dumped and thrown back together and then taped. A live plant was packed in one of the bathroom boxes. The key was removed from our big tool box but was not included in the parts box. We cannot access it. We are missing two of the four specialty screws necessary to reassemble our bed set, so we are still not sleeping in our own bed. We did not just get the B Team for packers, we got a quick and shoddy F Team (other than the young man who carefully packed our kitchen and china cabinet). We spent over 10K for movers to make our cross-country trek less stressful; they have made it more so. I wish we had gone with any other company than Corrigan, and I advise you to never use them until they step up their game.

Move size: 4 Bedroom Home Service cost: $14000

Administrative staff and salesperson were great to deal with. Very professional and accomodating. NOW lets talk about the moving staff. If you have nice furniture and personal belongings, my suggestion to you is to find another company. Our experience was...to put it politely...very disappointing. We had a very short move of only 8 miles (Commerce Twp to Milford, MI). Our belongings were loaded onto the truck with no one in charge directing the load. The crew (6 men) appeared to be in a hurry and there was no rhyme or reason in the way they loaded the truck. In an attempt to ensure that they would exercise some degree of care and caution, I gave each member of the moving crew a $30 tip ($180 total) to ensure they would be careful when they arrived at our new home. That was a complete waste of $180. I specifically asked the crew to be careful and also to use tarps on our floors. When I arrrived at our new home I found tarps haphazeredly thrown around and not covering the new floors. Additionally, NO tarps were laid on any of the areas (bedrooms) which were carpeted. Many expensive items of furniture were gouged, scratched and broken. No protective coverings were put on the door frames and stairwells as was promised. As of today (9 weeks after our move), we are still finding damage to our belongings,,,especially furniture. I would NOT recommend Corrigan Moving for your move. If you do use them, I suggest you pay very careful atention to each item as they load and unload. DO NOT accept them at their word to identify all the damage that they were responsible for. Damaged items were placed in our basement in such a way as to conceal the damage. We now find ourselves in a position of having to file a second claim for many more additional furniture items which were damaged. I'll keep you posted on that effort!

Michael Sturm

Milford, MI

Move size: 4 Bedroom Home Service cost: $3500

  We worked with John Silvernail of Corrigan United to move our family from Colorado to California in June, 2014.  We were told a single van would transport our belongings from our old home to our new home. Our move was estimated at 9750#.  We obtained several quotes all with similar estimates. We chose Corrigan/United for low cost and seemingly great communication with John Silvernail.   -- 6/26: Packing went overall well, performed by Mesa crew (a local sub-contractor)   -- 6/27: On the morning scheduled for pickup (a Friday) the United/Corrigan van did not arrive and we could not reach Corrigan (later we found out the van was running several days late but we didn't know it at the time).  Later in the day our pickup was subcontracted to Mesa and a too-small shuttle van arrived with an understaffed crew around 5:00PM. Their van/crew left at 10PM but we still had a full basement. We were told a new van would arrive first thing the next morning prior to our scheduled flights out of Colorado.   -- 6/28: No van arrived. We could not reach Mesa or Corrigan United until late into the morning.  We were asked to move the rest of our belongings into the garage and leave them there for pickup that evening. Our flights left Colorado mid-day. We left with our two small children, our belongings still in the garage, stressed, tired, and upset.  Later in the day we were told the items wouldn't be picked up for several days. These belongings left in the garage were not itemized - we took pictures and videos for documentation.   -- 6/29: No word from United/Corrigan   -- 6/30: Mesa picked up the second load from our house using a "shuttle-truck" again without us present (we told a neighbor the garage code to let them in).   -- The large Corrigan/United truck picked up our items from Mesa (located in Aurora).  Our items were "sandwiched" around a second load headed for Santa Rosa (we found out later from John Silvernail that this shipment weighed 1880#).   -- 7/4: Truck arrives for "pre" drop-off weight at Rossitor Relocation Systems in Livermore, CA (62,560#)   -- 7/5: Truck drops off our items in our new home.  Drop-off went smoothly until the team realized there was no "bolt-box" so our furniture could not be reassembled.  Our beds remained disassembled for several days.  A woman's Specialized bicycle never arrived - it was missing.  Driver of large truck acknowledged (after drop-off) that it had been itemized by the Mesa Crew but was not present at Mesa when he loaded his truck.  Don't know why he didn't mention it at the time of drop-off.   -- The truck's "post" drop-off weight 50,940#, 1870# heavier than the 9750# originally quoted.  Later when questioned, Jon Silvernail (Corrigan) stated that the Santa Rosa shipment was removed from the large truck to a small shuttle truck, however Gary Rossiter disputed this fact.  The 1870# extra is very similar to the Santa Rosa shipment (1880#).  Could not obtain extra documentation despite contacting both United/Corrigan and Rossiter, and involving the BBB.   -- Damage to property included a rip in our couch (repaired) and ~ $200 in other damaged goods.   -- Ultimately the charges were 15% higher than estimated.  The fee was paid by my employer before I had the chance to appeal, which meant other budgeted moving expenses (flights, car transport) had to be paid out of pocket.   -- Beware. We would never wish this moving experience on anyone.    .

Service cost: $9058

Here is my story. I have moved cross country many times so am very familiar with how the moving industry works. I have had some very good experiences, some good experiences, and never any bad ones - until now.

I picked Corrigan and that was a huge mistake. It was easy to get an appointment and have someone come over and do the survey. This was the best and the most professional part of the move. Once I had the estimate from them (and others), I narrowed the list down to these guys. We picked a moving date, gave them my credit card number and I thought all was good.

The day before the scheduled move, I did not receive any information in terms of what time the movers would come to my house, so I emailed the coordinator. I received a response about 4-6 hours later stating that the movers will be at my house in the morning. I think the delay was due to the fact that they just forgot about this move. But I will give them the benefit of the doubt and say that this is par for course.

The next day, the movers arrived. Their first reaction on seeing my place was "this has stairs. We don't like stairs". Honestly guys, I did not build these stairs after the survey was done. They were always there and you should have known about it. After the initial grumbling, they started the move. I asked them repeatedly to not use the stairs inside my house to go downstairs, but use the outside stairwell (which would have been a lot easier for them in my opinion ). Other movers made the same comment that it was nice to have the outside stairwell which was straight down as opposed to circular (inside the house). But these guys did not listen and kept on using the inside stairwell. I was nervous, because our railing were made of glass and I did not want it to get damaged.

Then one of the movers (the leader) wanted to use the bathroom and I pointed out that the guest bathroom was on the first floor (they were on the second floor). He did not want to go downstairs and asked why he could not use our personal bathrooms. And I quote "I am not going number 2 so what is the big deal". There were 3 movers and I was all alone in the house. They were moving my valuable and belongings - I felt like I had no choice but to give into their every whim.

More complaints when they had to move a piano/keyboard down the stairs. Complaint after complaint after complaint. It just got so bad that I wanted them out of my house. Finally 4-5 hours later, we were done. Once again the leader asked me to sign some documents, said they did not damage anything in my house because he checked and would not lie. So I signed as I wanted them out. And yes, there was drywall damage (hole the size of a quarter) on the walls going down the stairs.

Then came the delivery to our brand new house. We had closed on the house a few days prior to the delivery and after the delivery was completed, the house was badly beaten up including significant floor and wall damage, furniture damage, railing damage.

So when I contacted Corrigan, they stated that the delivery was done by another company named Hilldrup so they would be responsible for the repairs in the house. Corrigan would be responsible for the furniture damage (which there was quiet a bit). So now I had to deal with two companies. Fortunately, Hilldrup was easy to work with, they sent someone over to fix the issues in the house and I was happy with them.

Corrigan on the other hand was a pain. So what they did on the inventory sheet was mark each and every piece of furniture with some sort of damage. Every single piece. It was so bad that I had a brand new Piano/Keyboard that had recently arrived. It was in impeccable condition. They even marked the piano as damaged. Looking at the piano now, there is no damage. Zero. So they just made things up so that they would not be held responsible for the actual damage. I have pictures of before and after for all large pieces of furniture.

When the inspector came over, he was rude. I asked him to take off his shoes (as all our guests do). He refused. He also came 2 hours prior to his appointment and expected us to accommodate him. He inspected the furniture, stated a few incorrect things and was out in a few minutes. Then a few days later we heard from Corrigan that all out claims were denied. We only claimed damage on maybe 5-6 pieces of furniture that were damaged by them. Their answer was that the damage was pre-existing or was caused due to climatic conditions (so blame the weather but don't take any responsibilities). Remember the brand new piano that allegedly was damaged too - what a scam.

Long story short. I have moved many times and these guys were the absolute worst. I want people to be aware of them and I would recommend you use another mover. Happy to provide pictures or other details to those interested.

Move size: 3 Bedroom Home Service cost: $5500

MUCH MUCH damage. Items can not be replaced. Packers were only concerned with their phones, breaks and lunch. This move was a disaster from the first day through the last.

I might just as well have pushed my belongings off a cliff and saved the cost of moving!

Furniture items dropped/smashed/broken.

Items tossed into boxes with no packing at all! They showed NO CARE for my property. I am SICK over this.

Working with United on compensation for damage was as horrible as the move.

AVOID CORRIGAN/UNITED.

Move size: 1 Bedroom Home Service cost: $5600

I would not recommend using Corrigan Moving Systems especially if your items will be in storage for any length of time. My items were in storage for approximately a year and when numerous pieces of furniture came out damaged due to the lack of climate control they told me they were not responsible (even though I had paid for full valuation). Also, a "high value china" box (with many sentimental pieces from my grandparents) was so overpacked (and in a box that was too large for china) that the entire two bottom layers came out in pieces. Also, just found out they owed me $1600 that was never credited after 3 months.

Service cost: $18000

I had a small amount of goods moved from Chicago to the Bay area. I paid for full replacement value on any goods damaged in transit. When the offloading of goods happened in the Bay area, the local movers told me that the Chicago movers had packed the goods incorrectly in the shipping containers. Large heavy antique wood furniture were rested short side down, without any padding underneath. This lead to crush marks and indentations in the wood. Antique wood furniture was scratched up.
When the complaint was filed, Corrigan did not provide full value replacement; they only offered repair from a repair serviceman who lacked the skill to handle antique items. I pointed out the lack of experience and there were others in the Bay area with the appropriate skill level, but Corrigan offered only repair from their contracted service person….no full replacement value.

I would never recommend this service to friends or family who are still in the Midwest. I also have told my company never to use this company for corporate moves.

Move size: Partial Move Service cost: $6600

No wonder Corrigan Moving System has ONE STAR.

They are not only terrible with their customers and I wish I had checked them before doing a job for them. They requested an inspection report. I contacted their customer made an appointment, went to the customer home to do the inspection and sent the inspection report to Corrigan with pictures and my professional opinion. Corrigan (Deborah Sivic
Customer Assistance) said the report was not acceptable because their customer was LYING and the damage was pre-existing. Great company to do business with. NOT.

Move size: 3 Bedroom Home Service cost: $150