Platinum Van Lines

We had a HORRIBLE experience with Platinum Van Lines-Hotlanta Movers.  The following is  5 reasons not to choose this company. Oh, and they are not accredited by BBB, which should have been our red flag warning.
1. This company may not subcontract, but apparently they have a sister company, Hotlanta Movers. This was never mentioned until the day of our move when a Hotlanta truck pulled up. They may have other sister companies, so watch out!
2.  Inventory list you create with the reservation specialist is relatively useless. a.   First of all, they do not have specialist to come out and take inventory of your belongings. You have to estimate sq ft of stuff on your own. b.  Driver/packers may not be given the updated list, plus they don’t read through it so any items that may need special packing may not get the right treatment, which equals broken items!
3.  Along with the “useless inventory list” (driver’s words, not mine), beware of overcharges! a. Our initial bid was close to $2500 and I knew we would have more stuff and pay accordingly. Turns out instead of approx. 700 sq ft of belongings, we had close to 900 (nobody actually does any measuring). Our price went from the approx. $2500 to approx. $4500. After we called customer service, who connected us to dispatch they realized the driver never had the new inventory list and was pricing wrong but ultimately said, he will give you a price and you take it or leave it. After a quick phone call with his boss he gave us what seemed to be an arbitrary number of $3500. My husband is an Actuary and does calculations all day, and did the math of the driver’s inventory and we should have paid $300 less than we did, but at the time we had to settle at $3500 just to get or stuff on the road! b.    We were also charged for several boxes we provided, a mattress bag and they also used some of our packing supplies- again, could have been avoided had they taken a look at our inventory list.
4.  Reservation specialist deceived us and customer service is rude!!
a. The reservation specialist was EXTREMELY cordial and helpful at first (I even requested to speak to his supervisor just to compliment him on his customer service. He articulated himself well and promised us no surprises and also said he would be available throughout the process. WRONG!! The minute we signed the contract, sent the check, he disappeared. We called several times and he was always “out of the office” so of course we didn’t think anything of it but kept trying. Then we emailed and never heard back. Finally, after tons of stress and agony from the moving day, I sent him an email titled “BBB Complaint” because we knew we would be filing a complaint but wanted to give him a chance to make amends. , Finally, his supervisor wrote back saying that the reservation specialist didn’t have access to our account after we signed the contract which is why he never returned calls/emails. Well why the hell did he say he would be available and why didn’t someone tell us earlier instead of making endless excuses?? b. Customer Service is rude. I spoke to a lady by the name of Stephanie the day of the move because I was horrified at the pricing issue we experienced. She was condescending and defensive. She also claimed she would go through all of my paperwork once the truck and driver returned which was a lie because she clearly should have known that they don’t actually deal with claims in the office (See number 5).
5.  If you mistakenly select to use this company and have a bad experience, the filing of a claim will be even worse. It is a huge hassel, and you will feel like nobody is on your side. Keep documentation of every email, every broken item (pics, receipts, etc.,) and all the moving paperwork bc you will have to scan it and submit it to the claims company. a.  You file a complaint with Platinum Van Lines with a brief description of what you were overcharged. They fwd you to a claims company, who requires you to set up an account with them, get approval of registration, get a password and then finally you can login.  Then you go through line by line to put in the info, with weight, description, value. Upload pics (I had to email them bc the site wouldn’t allow me to upload large files, and provide a written complaint. All the while, they are supposedly getting info from the company and once they review documents, they will get back to you.   b. We were in a situation where our broken items don’t add up to the deductible so we prob won’t ever be able to recover our broken items! The only reason we didn’t hire an attorney is because we aren’t really litigious people, but we still went through with filing the complaint because we want to have supporting documents to present to the BBB.

Service cost: $3500

Terrible eperience. Pure Extortian. Company did not honor estimate.  5 movers showed up to load us out of house. 1 mover showed up to load us in. The job was to big for 1 mover. He stacked the boxes. Crushing the fragile contents of several. He just bascially dropped them off and left. Would not move items upstairs. Antiques were not protectes and several pieces are broken and scratched. Some items are value are missing.  BE WARNED BEFORE USING THIS COMPANY. WE DID NOT SELECT THEM, UNBEKNOWNST TO US, WE WERE SUBCONTRACTED WITH THEM THRU BUDGET. DO YOUR HOMEWORK. WE WERE (OVER) CHARGED 3500.00 FOR BROKEN, SCRATCHED, and LOST ITEMS.

Service cost: $3495

We moved from Ohio to Illinois. They pick up our stuff as planned. Charged us 300 extra for extra packing. Any how they also promised delivery in 3 days almost 380 miles. Delivered after 6 days. A big suite case is lost with precious items inside. Coupe things stolen from other suit cases. Tried to call broiler dispatcher and drive with zero luck. However they use to call you 100times until you sign contract. Then you are stuck with this garbage. I won't recommend it at all. Punch of liars and thieves. Be aware.

Service cost: $3200

 BE WARNED BEFORE USING THIS COMPANY. They stolen my big suitcase which has all my expensive and new stuff. they damage my new leather sectional sofa very big cut in the leather while they took rapping off from it. Never. Ever use this company.
 BE WARNED BEFORE USING THIS COMPANY. They stolen my big suitcase which has all my expensive and new stuff. they damage my new leather sectional sofa very big cut in the leather while they took rapping off from it. Never. Ever use this company.

Service cost: $3200

I gave platinum van lines a 1star only because I couldn’t have given it less. These people are very dishonest in their representation of services and fees. I got a “binding” quote from my salesperson, Alex. When the movers finally showed up 2+ hours late, my “binding fee” suddenly increased by $600. We continued with the move, but when signing the final paperwork, it was disclosed that they would not deliver our things until nearly a month later. Problematic when everything my daughter owned and needed for the next month OUT OF THE COUNTRY and to transfer to a new school upon her return from Europe was sitting in storage. We turned around after a full days drive toward Oklahoma (from LA) to rent our own truck, retrieve my daughters belongings from the storage unit they put it in, and drive it home ourselves. They refunded part of my money but after reading reviews, I think I’m just glad to have her belongings back (though We have not opened every box or bag to make sure nothing was taken yet). I tried contacting our salesperson for assistance but he never returned any calls or texts. This is a horrible moving company. Never under any circumstances would I recommend them.

Move size: Studio Service cost: $1775