Exclusive Van Lines

SCAM! AVOID AT ALL COSTS!

Unfortunately I fell for this scam run by two “moving” companies, currently using the names Exclusive Van Lines and Bridgeview Van Lines. These people are thieves who use the moving industry as their method of theft. Based on a FaceTime walk though of all the things in my apartment to be moved, they quoted me a price of $2,900 for an intercity move, somewhat less than what other companies quoted, but not a lot less. Though my lease was ending, they wouldn’t give me a date for when they would do the move until a few days before. However as those days came and went I kept calling them, they kept promising me to call me back within a specific time, and they never did. With just a couple days left and no response from them, I was forced to scramble to look for last minute alternates.

They did finally show up with one day left. I was so relived they actually came, and really had no alternatives, so that when they announced that even though I had 10% FEWER boxes than they estimated, they were going to charge me a total of $6,170, more than double what they had quoted me (and a lot more than any other moving company I had talked to months before). At this point I had no alternative, so I agreed.

When they arrived at the moving destination, they demanded that before opening the truck and letting me even see my belongs that: a) I sign a document saying that I had already received all my belongings, and that they were all in good condition, b) I pay the remaining balance of $1,270 in cash, and c) that I pay them an additional $500 in cash for what they said was a long hallway (it was less than 50 feet, and they knew all along that this was going into a big apartment building). They made it very clear that they were holding my belongs hostage until I did all these things, and if I didn’t do them, I’d never see any of my belongs again. The movers put me on the phone with their boss in the Bronx, who in full Mafia style was really threatening and nasty, and dared me to call the police, and told his men to just drive away.

In order to get my belongings, I had to do everything they said. My boxes were beat-up, with the fragile arrows upside-down, etc. There weren’t even box numbers or my name on anything – and so I didn’t get all my stuff (though they did give me a TV that wasn’t mine, which I had them take back – but it isn’t going to do its owner any good, since the screen was smashed in). And needless to say, several things of mine that I did get were broken. All in all, $900 of my possessions were lost or broken, and the “insurance policy” that they claimed to have offered me a total of less than $150 to compensate for everything they had lost or broken.

So I paid $6,670 for a job with a guaranteed price of $2,970 and the worst moving experience of my life – these people intentionally underquote to lure people in, and then hold your belongs hostage as they extort you for way more than you’d ever pay for any other mover. I have reached out to the district attorney’s offices of my old and new home to see if there’s any way to criminally prosecute these people for fraud, or at least put them out of business.

P.S. If you look at their online reviews you’ll see other people with similar experiences – but you’ll also see many good reviews – which I’m pretty sure are fake reviews they’ve done on themselves.

Move size: 1 Bedroom Home Service cost: $6670

Very unprofessional company that uses extortionist & bait and switch tactics to force the consumer to pay a higher amount than they were initially quoted. I itemized every single thing going on the truck, and the day of moving they jacked up the price over another $1700, claiming we really had 1620 cu ft from the previous estimate of 1202 cu ft. It's not possible that our furniture expanded by more than a 5'x10' storage unit, and the excuse from the driver was "sometimes furniture is different sizes". That isn't possible when they still left several large items off the truck that were on the lower estimate. I wish we had done more research as movers that give you an estimate based on cubic feet ARE NOT REPUTABLE according to several sites I have now discovered. They deliberately mishandled our property, causing over $8700 of damage in replacement costs, and the initial salesperson as well as two of the movers claimed that we would receive full replacement value and the ".60 per pound" didn't apply to us. The day of moving they show up with paperwork stating that full replacement value would double the cost, and forced us to sign stating that we would not get full replacement value. I WOULD HAVE NEVER GONE WITH THEM IF THIS WAS TOLD TO US BEFORE WE MADE A DEPOSIT. Over 75% of our boxes were crushed, perforated, and showed signs of being dropped. One of the workers was cussing in Spanish, flipped boxes on their sides clearly marked with arrows, and kicked our property across the truck that fell out of a plastic bin. They broke a glass top antique table within an hour of being there, and made the comment "We're not making any money on this move" and even had the audacity to demand a tip after breaking my antique table on the day of moving! The positive reviews do not use common English and are vague, which suggests they were written by someone in another country and are fake. Our experience has been an absolute nightmare and the only manager we could talk to, Paula has been condescending and apathetic. They have not responded to our written complaints about their employee's behavior, nor have they offered any amount for the damage to our property. DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY!

Move size: 2 Bedroom Home Service cost: $7138

Never use this company. They are nothing but thieves. BBB and FMSCA, as well as the Florida attorney general's office should investigate them. There is no way my experience was an isolated one. Their practice is uniformly crooked from the leadership to the hustlers they have answering the phone. They will lose your furniture, destroy your belongings, and damage your home. They will not respond to an inquiry. I can gladly provide proof of service with these thieves for anyone doubting the veracity of the review.

Service cost: $7000

This was the worst experience! My husband and I have relocated several times and used a few different moving services. We always opt for a full package (packing) I called and spoke to one of their representatives on 4/19/16 to get a quote and was quoted for a full move 6200.00 moving from SC to NC. The man I spoke to took inventory by phone and told me my price was guaranteed to not go any higher. I was told that the packers would arrive on 6/2/2016 and the movers on 6/3/2016. He also told me I would receive a call 2 weeks before by move to firm up the inventory list and times. I put down the deposit (which can only be refunded if you cancel 7 days prior to the move) and waited for the call. One week before the move I still had no call so I called them and was treated like I was an idiot and told they call the day before to provide a time and that no way anyone at their company told me 2 weeks. I finally did receive a call from the QA department to confirm my inventory list 6 days before my move date (too late to request a refund). Which the woman said my inventory list was entered wrong and if I wanted everything moved it would be an additional 1600.00. I compared the 2 inventory list and they were identical with the only difference being a rocking chair. I was stuck. I removed items from the inventory to get back to the original price. We had to rent a U-Haul to pack and move items on our own. The day before the move we were told the movers would arrive at our home by 12:00, they showed at 10:00. Five men to pack and load our items in ONE day, we were told it would be pack one day load the next day, which caused us to have to rent a hotel room because they were moving our beds a day early. I wish I could send pictures of the packing job they did. Broken pictures, canned goods thrown on bread. they did not mark any boxes so at delivery all 66 boxes (our inventory list had 144 boxes listed) were piled in my dining room, they did not wrap all of the breakable items and the urn for our infant daughters was broken, numerous other things were thrown in boxes including our hanging clothes. The packers used large dish boxes and used so much paper on coffee cups only 12 cups were packed in one box. when the packing was completed the driver tells us that he can not fit everything on the inventory list on the truck that we were misquoted and needed to pay more money we ended up paying an additional amount to have our items moved. Nothing in the garage was moved (although it was on the inventory list), our master bedroom bed was not moved because they didn't have room, they did not pack the bathrooms, left pictures on the walls and things in the kitchen. and had the nerve to ask us for a tip. Our items were delivered on 6/4/2016 by two men in a Budget truck they had rented. All the boxes were left in the dining room because they were not marked. The truck they had rented to deliver our things had a broken lift. This was a nightmare experience for us. This company did not send us professional packers/movers, which is what our contract. This was not a full packing job, which was also in our contract. The packers treated our belongings like it was trash. Not only did they not move everything on our inventory list, we had to rent a U-Haul trailer and move some items and will have to go back again to SC to remove the rest of our belongings and rent another U-Haul and rent another hotel room.

Service cost: $7800

Horrifying move. 3 guys came to pack us up. Helped me with an emergency during packing truck.Then I found out my husband's WIDE solid gold wedding band missing. Irreplaceable. Married 50 years. I also found out they take it to Maryland to wait for another moving truck & crew to reload it & bring it to our state. We had to stay in a motel till they got to our house with the furniture. Only had 2 guys to unload truck. Took hours & the co. Had another load to deliver after us. Way under staffed. After I started unpacking found broken lamps ,dishes and antique cedar chest had EVERY leg completely broken off. Still wrapped in moving blanket and taped . I wondered then why they hadn't taken their moving blanket. Suppose to set up bed. They didn't know how to set up a select comfort bed.
Will never ever recommend them to anybody . Horrible,horrible move.

Service cost: $6155

1) The initial quote/estimate was severely under quoted so on moving day, I was presented with a bill twice the amount I was quoted from $5000 to $11000.
2) An expensive watch was stolen
3) Furniture was damaged and broken
4) Walls were damaged
5) ZERO support from customer service once move was completed regarding my complaints although Customer Service Reps were like HAWKS when they wanted my business.
6) Furniture couldn't be put together correctly because the movers didn't tape the nuts/bolts with the right piece. They threw them into a random box and many screws/bolts were lost.

Move size: 2 Bedroom Home Service cost: $11000

I urge anyone planning an upcoming move not to contract with Exclusive Van Lines! We recently completed receipt of our belongings and were very disappointed in numerous aspects of the move. Don’t be misled by attractive low-ball estimates and claims of “professional” quality moving services. Exclusive Van Lines may deliver your furniture to your new address but they won’t deliver on their estimate or on their claim of “professional” quality service. Below is a summary of our experiences in several aspects of our recent move.

Estimating Process was POOR- Estimate was increased by over 25% on day of move. This affected cost of both the tariff charges and the full pack, but more importantly, the storage cost over 10 months. The tariff cost went from estimate of $10,212 to actual of $11,718. Packing cost went from estimate of $3,404 to $4,785 Storage fee Increase was $239/mo for 10 mos . Total increase over estimate was $5,277.

Packing Schedule was POOR - The schedule Leo offered was to have packing done on day one and the load/ move done on day 2. The day the packers arrived, they had the trucks with them and indicated they would be doing the entire pack and move in a single day. The result was a rushed packing job with many items poorly packed; a foyer closet was totally overlooked along with several kitchen cabinets. Due to the late hour, the crew leader did not conduct a walk-through with us to confirm all items were packed and we ended up packing and moving them ourselves.
In packing the wine and liquor ourselves, we found that the Russian crew had hidden a sealed bottle of Russian vodka in a trash carton in an attempt to pilfer it. We moved it from the trash to one of our cartons and foiled their plan.

Move-in Staff INADEQUATE- on the delivery at our new address is where we were really disappointed in having selected Exclusive Van Lines to handle our move. Only a 4-man crew arrived with two trucks. Ironically, the two trucks seemed to carry all our possessions with room to spare inside where on the packing day they had belongings extended onto tailgates and claimed we were 838 cu ft over estimate!

Special Handling of Pool Table was POOR - the 4 person crew was not nearly sufficient to move the regulation pool table. We paid a $350 “special handling” fee to have the table disassembled and moved. The packing crew did not fully disassemble the bed and 3 pieces of slate, but moved the entire bed with slate as a unit. Nine Russian men had difficulty at the old address, yet only 4 were expected to place the table at our new home. Fortunately, our son was available along with me to help, but it wasn’t pretty! The crew also assembled the legs to the table incorrectly. The “special handling” charge was a total fraud!

Furniture Handling and Storage was POOR - damages to furniture included: irreplaceable marble-top table broken into two pieces, bedroom dresser bottom punctured with softball-sized hole, occasional table leg broken (movers made feeble repair attempt without informing of damage), bed footboard spindle broken, dresser leg broken, paper shredder and 3 table lamps broken. In addition, 20 pieces of china, glassware, and serving dishes were broken along with 7 other decorative glass and ceramic pieces.

We should have done more homework up front reading reviews of others’ experiences with exclusive van lines as there are many with experiences similar to ours. We learned through the school of hard knocks that you may not get what you expect. The bottom line is that we would neither think of engaging with Exclusive Van Lines on our next move, nor would we recommend their services to others in need of moving services.

Move size: 4 Bedroom Home Service cost: $36153