MoveCorp

These are words that spring to mind to describe the removal company Movecorp. When you reach my age (nearly 80) you will no doubt have moved several times - know what to expect, right? WRONG! Nobody who hasn't had the misfortune to choose Movecorp (Walsall) would believe the depths to which a removal company could sink. Blatant lies, malpractice of the worst kind, disregard for property (my valuable baby grand piano was slid down the stairs as the requested and promised specialist equipment was not provided). Money paid up front in full, goods all packed, after weeks of waiting the day arrived - my return to England after 17 years in France. Passage booked, all things running smoothly. Huge double lorry arrived (impressive) but wait.. what's that? Can't you take much? No space, and a ferry to catch? Tears, pleading - at least come and look. Oh thank you, thank you. You'll look but..
Only take a few items? Those plastic sacks of clothing, bedding, wool etc? Oh and the fridge. No bed? What will I sleep on? Completely bewildered and traumatized, I lock up house, containing all my belongings and leave for France.
Contact Movecorp. What about collecting my stuff still left in France? What's that? You want another £1600 to do so? Plus VAT? Are you not joking? What about if I take you to court? Ah, thought that would change your mind. You'll go back in 2 weeks, 3 weeks, 4 weeks, sometime. Yes, there'll be enough space on the lorry this time. Yes of course also the trolley and braces for the professional handling of the grand piano. No worries, it'll happen this time. Foolishly I believe you. What else can I do, you have my money. In France, you only pay once the goods have been delivered. What a wise system. Hooray, only 5 weeks later, and my goods are due to be delivered. During that time my daughter had to buy a new bed so that at least I could sleep. Hello, what's this? Where are my sideboards, bookshelves, chests of drawers, T.V etc etc etc etc etc? What's that you say? You're telling me I agreed that you could leave them behind? Oh right!! So I'm happy living out of cardboard boxes with all my clothes, books, personal items strewn around on the floor. Wait, if I pay you another £1,200 (I know, plus VAT) you might be persuaded to go back and make a third attempt. ENOUGH. I'm obviously talking to people from another planet. Now what? I know, report them to the removal ombudsman. Simple. They'll sort them out. Get them to come up to standard, or be struck off the register. Ha ha. The removal ombudsman, or should I say ombudswoman? Turns out she's a one-woman show. Answerable to nobody. So not regulated? Surely a situation open to abuse, which to my mind needs investigating. An elusive lady who seldom answers the phone, or reads emails. I thought I was dealing with a full sized official government body designed to protect the public. She was so evidently biased that I had to check on the internet that this was a bona fide organization. Meant to find out who pays her salary. Either very naive, gullible or easily influenced, she swallowed MoveCorps blatant lies as water in a desert. After 5 months of continued plying with emails (with the help of the tradings officer) she vaguely told me "Oh I thought I'd sent you my decision, I'll do it right away." Three weeks later, still no decision. Phone call. "Oh, who are you? No, I haven't seen your recent emails or those from the trading officer. I admit I've been rather overwhelmed recently. Not been well." When I openly challenged her with not reading my account of events concerning Movecorp she made no attempt at denial. Inspires one with confidence, eh? Now, seven months after paying this company to move my goods from France to England, I am still living surrounded by cardboard boxes and about £3000 of my furniture still awaits collection. If all those folk out there with similar experiences of dealing with Movecorp would care to contact me and join my efforts to make this scandalous company accountable for its conduct, please email me. I am also in contact with a reporter at the Express and Star. You might like to let them know of your experiences.

Service cost: £1600

The removal men did not turn up on the agreed day and as it was a public holiday in the UK so nobody from Movecorp answered the phones or emails. This means we wasted a whole day sat around from 9.00am until 18.00 waiting for removal men who never turned up. The delivery was then not made within the selected one week time slot we had agreed. To add insult to injury we were erroneously charged twice for insurance due to their admin error. A month later they have not credited me for their duplicate payment they charged to my credit card despite emails and phone calls.

Service cost: £1700

Nice and easy. This is the second time I have used Movecorp, first time for a business move to Holland in November 2012 and now my house move back to London, and I cannot fault any of their business structure. The removal teams I have had have been superb, nothing was too much trouble. The packing and unpacking was carried out carefully and quickly, everything placed in the rooms marked on the boxes and all the empty boxes and packing broken down and placed tidily in the garage. The office staff were as efficient as before, questions answered quickly, timetables adhered to and the quote figure given was the figure paid when the contract was completed. I will certainly use them again and would recommend them unreservedly.

Service cost: £1800

Movecorp is unundoubtedly the worst international removal firm that you could find. They have ripped me off from the first day and continue trying to steal more money despite never delivering my goods. They are running a scam whereby the offer a low price to ship your things, then once you agree and pay the fee up front, your things are collected and you never see them again,  unless you are willing to pay numerous additional fees that appear once movecorp are in possession of your items. Even other customers have contacted me for advice after being cheated by this same scam. Avoid movecorp like the plague.

Service cost: £3000

Movecorp were very poor. The service was so poor to write in detail I have to bullet point it:
1. Misquoted as person on charge came back from long leave and so didn’t know current rates. Upped cost.
2. Misquoted as told me insurances rates changed but in fact they were quoting from wrong item list. Tried to up cost but had to constantly have to correct them.
3. Quoted 8-12 weeks pick up to delivery. It took 6 months!
4. Damaged property and when quoted only paid 50% of value written.
5. Didn’t itemise the property packed. So customs had to delay delivery, possibly having to unpack and itemise the property themselves.
6. Never responded to queries immediately and when done was done with short, unreasoned answers, and no help at all.

In essence, expensive, misquoting, poor customer service, late and poorly handled property!

I have relocated many times and Movecorp has been the worst by far! I would strongly recommend to avoid!

Service cost: £3000

Our moving process started quite promisingly, in fact right up to collection (and receiving our money) it was actually very good. However, what a different experience after our payment was made. Household goods poorly packed, several significantly valuable items left uncrated. We also arranged and paid for several more crates that were not provided. Company later tried to establish that measurements of furniture we provided were incorrect and so prepared crates could not be used. They then suggested missing crates were seized by Australian customs officials (We contacted Australian Customs - this alleged practice does not occur). We received absolutely NO communication from this company when these alleged "problems" subsequently arose with our shipment to alert us, or help find alternative solutions. We were left to discover a significant list of glaring errors, oversights and omissions ourselves upon delivery of shipment. Manager was less than sympathetic and sometimes did not respond to communications from us. Very frustrating. However, let the following facts speak for themselves: a large insurance claim against Movecorp was eventually settled in our favour… also, additional complaints lodged with UK Moving Ombudsman regarding service issues (after receiving virtually no assistance from Movecorp and making almost no progress towards resolution of our complaints, despite 16 months of patient correspondence), also was quickly settled in our favour. We will never use this company again and definitely will never recommend them. This was an utterly regrettable and highly stressful experience for us. Let the buyer beware!

Service cost: £11000

Moving with Movecorp was a very painful experience. I was moving from Germany to the United States. At first, they were very responsive and I had a good feeling about the whole thing. They asked for a two week window for pickup, so I gave them my last two weeks in Germany, which was the end of January through the first 10 days of February. They then informed me that they couldn't come those two weeks and would be there a week early. I rearranged my schedule to accommodate them. They had delays, so then they said they would be there the first week of my two week window. Then they had more delays and would be there the second week of my two week window. A day before I was supposed to leave, they notified me that the truck was full and would be returning to England and would come back a few weeks later. I said I couldn't wait a few weeks because I was leaving the country, so they had a local partner come pick up my stuff and store it until they could pick it up, all at my expense.
Once my stuff had been picked up, the communication got much slower, and I didn't hear anything unless I asked. The container didn't leave England until late June. Once it left England, Schumacher Cargo, an American company, took over. They communicated well, I did have to pay an additional customs fee, but I had no issues with them or with my stuff getting delivered.
Finally, in August, six months after I left Germany, I finally received my things. However, a china dish was cracked, a leg was broken off of a chair, a pot and a bowl were cracked, and some glasses were shattered. I was really only concerned about the china dish and the chair, so I got quotes to repair and/or replace them, and asked for $225, which is only a little more than I had paid for insurance. They said they would only give me the current values that I had on one of the forms I had filled out, which I thought was fair, and this was $76.40. However, there was a nearly $50 policy excess, which no one had mentioned to me before, so my total was down to $27.74. After the $20 transfer fees, I ended up getting $7.74. Needless to say, that didn't cover the costs of the dish or the chair, or even the tacos I had for dinner that night.
Next time, I will choose a company that will do it right.

Service cost: £2086

If you're looking for a professional, reliable, efficient moving company then do not go with Movecorp!

I had to arrange removal and storage of several boxes from Maastricht (NL) to Canterbury (UK). I had contacted Movecorp well in advance of my actual move date in order to overcome any last minute issues. This was particularly important as my move date also meant the end of my tenancy agreement and my permanent departure from the Netherlands.

After having paid for door-to-door collection, I was informed that a confirmed removal date would be passed on nearer to my actual move (20 July).

Prior to me moving, I had to constantly push for information, always emailing and telephoning my contact at Movecorp for information but to little avail. Whenever I asked a question, I would either receive a response beyond a reasonable time of waiting or no answer to my question at all. This was particularly problematic when asking time-sensitive questions as various arrangements had to be made involving third parties as well.

When it came to the actual collection I had received a confirmed date but this kept getting changed at the last minute due to 'unexpected delays.' I was as accommodating as I could be, and even having to allow for collection to take place in my absence (much to my disdain) as the crew would not make it to my address before my departure from the Netherlands. However, even with my patience that collection had been delayed over 4 times - eventually resulting in a failed collection. Of which I was not even informed of until my landlord told me several days later that the crew had simply not come by. When I spoke to my contact at Movecorp I was assured that I would receive an update on what happened and what steps would be taken to rectify the situation - again I had not received such an update until I pushed for it again.

Although Movecorp had later provided a rescheduled collection, it was not in my favour nor a suitable solution to their failed collection. My tenancy agreement had ended and I could no longer leave my things at the property. I asked Movecorp for help with making alternative arrangements for removal of my things from the property and to store them in Maastricht until the rescheduled collection but they had not provided a suitable solution nor given me much assistance. Following this I had to cancel my agreement with Movecorp.

I was told I would not get any refund as collection had been attempted but failed, and the rescheduled collection was Movecorp's so-called 'remedy.' However, I feel that the collection failed because Movecorp kept changing the dates and giving excuses as to why things kept changing.

I feel cheated and taken advantage of because I am paying for a service that had not happened. I was constantly reassured that there was nothing to worry about when clearly Movecorp had little control of the situation. When faced with an obstacle or difficult situation I feel that it was handled very unprofessionally as I was constantly left in the blue about information and updates (even after demanding better and more reliable communication, which was promised to me afterwards). I also feel that there was a severe lack in due diligence, care, and empathy. Movecorp knew that I was leaving the country (well in advance of my proposed collection date) thus they should have been better prepared in handling my case and accommodating to my circumstances when given the opportunity to do so.

Overall, although Movecorp tried they simply weren't up to par. I have lost a lot of money (for a student) on what turned out to be a massive waste of time. So unless you're okay with months of one-sided communication and hundreds of pounds on a move, that might not even happen, then by all means hire Movecorp.

Service cost: £500