PSS International Removals

I haven't even got my furniture yet! A move from the UK- Australia. I was told it would take approx 4 weeks for it to leave the uk. It's been 6 weeks and the advisor Robert still can't give me any info what is going on an I'm not happy. We feel as though we're being scammed to be honest! No one calls me back, no one tells me what is going on an it's not good enough! We have paid for a service we just aren't getting! I want it sorted out an I want someone professional to contact me an sort this mess out! We have had enough of being kept in the dark. The service so far has been useless!

Service cost: £2500

We recently used PSS to move a house lot from the UK to New Zealand. Up front they seemed really helpful, the packing team who worked on our house were efficient and helpful. But as we found out once our possessions were set to arrive in NZ, a number of the itemised inventories needed to clear customs hadn't been taken. In contacting PSS they were argumentative and unhelpful, meaning I had to work directly with NZ customs to get things straightened out. PSS also handed us over to NZ Van Lines to deliver our goods once on the ground who attempted to load us with additional 'fees' which were ultimately already included in what we had paid PSS. It was a really disappointing and stressful experience in the end ??

Service cost: £3600

In February 2017, I air freighted 6 large boxes with PSS from the UK to Japan. Originally the company were very helpful, polite and I felt secure with them. The paperwork was filled in promptly and the service was excellent.

The problem then began when I arrived in Japan. All the company had done was provide the boxes, pick them up and do customs clearance in the UK and Japan. Once that was finished they washed their hands of me. They air freighted the boxes with DHL.
DHL were an absolute pain! The website was never updated when I tried to see where my boxes were. I had no idea when my boxes were going to be delivered or what was happening.

I contacted PSS, and they refused to help. They just told me to contact DHL! After much difficulty (ringing the UK from Japan etc) I discovered there was a bit of my address missing. Neither DHL or PSS has bothered to contact me about it and resolve the issue. After weeks of waiting in (as it was never clear when the boxes were to arrive) they arrived three weeks late, the day before I was due to start work.

Considering the steep cost of sending 6 boxes, the worry and being restricted for more than three weeks, I would have thought the company would have tried to help me more. Anyway, I will not be using PSS again. And I'm also steering clear of DHL!

Move size: Partial Move Service cost: £995

This is by far the worst company I have ever had to deal with. I had to make a decision quickly, and unfortunately did not read these reviews beforehand. For my move from London to Abu Dhabi, I asked few companies for a quote, and PSS was on the cheap side. Their sales team being very nice and persistent, I decided to give them a chance. Do not make that mistake!!
- They overestimated the volume of consignment, and ask you to pay for it once they have removed your goods, i-e once you do not really have choice anymore. That was an extra 20%! - It took my goods a good 3 months to arrive, while other friends using other companies got their stuff in less than 1 month. When  I asked PSS about the reason for such a delay, they came up with some lies that were easy to cross check. - They charged me an extra fee to remove my goods from the port of Abu Dhabi (While this was supposed to be included in the price). When I asked for a split of the fees, this appear as ''abnormal charge''.. I can provide anyone who is interested with all the receipts and proofs if you want to have a look at it.

Service cost: $2800

£4829 Original quote once they assessed the size of container we'd require.
£6282 What we've had to pay PSS to have our things delivered.

Overspill, chassis charges, customs X-rays, currency fluctuations, you name it, they charged it. A 30% price hike once they had our goods in their hands.

That's the money side out the way. From a service point of view, they outsourced the job to some company from Plymouth. Bad packaging, half empty boxes (explains the overspill), and £2000 worth of damages. Even their own local US delivery company reported inadequate packaging (see the report I've uploaded). They won't even acknowledge that their own staff say the job was below standard.

Made our move to the US a living nightmare and all PSS offered was £100 good will gesture which we've turned down out of principle and have raised this with The Property Ombudsman.

Avoid! There are better companies out there. Go for one without a single bad review and who don't outsource. Even 1 bad in 5 reviews is a 20% chance that you'll end up with the service we received.

Service cost: £6282

Furniture was not packaged properly and badly damaged (see pictures of some of the worst items). Dresser had a huge, 43 cm gash across it. My stone-top table was completely cracked through -- the crack extended 80cm across the whole stone and through the entire 5cm depth of the stone.

Other items were cracked and crushed here and there. Service also didn't have very good communication -- never received updates on when the items were being shipped, estimated arrivals, and who the company on the US side would be. Had to actively email every few weeks to try and find out what was going on.

Move size: 1 Bedroom Home Service cost: $1200

The initial response to my enquiry was great, and they did a very fast arrangement for the collection and packing. The cost seemed to be reasonable too. However, the good stuff stop there.. The communication on the UK side was very confusing and keep getting mismatched communications from various people on the UK side - never know who is actually our move manager and the process was never explained to us clearly in getting through the custom (we had to find out from friends and family). The packing was very speedy, but they don't take great care with your goods, no bubble wrap or any extra paddings at the weak points of the items at all - just paper (it is pretty bad in comparison to the fantastic unpacking service we received from their partner, a different company in Canada) They don't pack china/glass/crystals or furniture corners properly..we ended up with damaged goods, including damages to our very expensive dining table, but that was not what really angered me - what really angered me was then it took us almost 2 months to get a very petty GPB50 for ALL the damages they caused. Their insurance claim department/partner is extremely slow in response and extremely unreasonable in the evaluation on damages (they refuse to pay any cost for damage evaluation, they just simply disagree, despite I got an email from a 3rd party professional repair evaluation service to confirm the cost of repair, they still disagree with that! - how do you reason with the unreasonable people?..), the whole process is so painful I gave up arguing with them via emails as I am 8 months pregnant. I will definitely not be using PSS International for our next move nor recommend it to any of our friends/family for moves.

Move size: Partial Move Service cost: £3300

These guys completely took advantage of my elderly mother. She understood the fragile items would be properly packed together onsite. There were three pictures and an antique mirror, which she loosely wrapped in a thin plastic tablecloth. And these lunatics posted it like that and now assume no responsibility for the fact that, surprise, surprise - they were completely smashed on arrival.

The insurance is totally useless and doesn’t cover anything so we literally just paid them to destroy our items.

Don’t use these cowboys!! Make sure to head over to google maps and leave a review there too- they are using fake reviews from a reputation management service on their website to make it look like they have a good reputation..let’s grt the word out!!

Move size: Partial Move Service cost: £100

I had a great initial meeting with PSS when I first considered moving to New Zealand in late 2016. I was impressed by the promise of careful personal service by a family owned firm. Following my father's death in South Africa and some stressful times in London I arranged my move for March 2018. Most of my goods were well packed and arrived intact although a few of the items which had been simply boxed were broken. However, I had paid a substantial extra amount for two items to be crated - a glass coffee table and an antique French mirrored dressing table.

The coffee table (which was a single unit consisting of glass panels glued together) had been inexplicably disassembled prior to crating so that the entire thing had come apart and could not be repaired. It was entirely destroyed.

The dressing table had been crated, but the most fragile element of it, the three panel mirror, had been left out of the crate and simply wrapped in corrugated cardboard with thin sheets of brown paper between the three hinged panels. As a result the central panel had smashed irretrievably. It is impossible to find replacement glass of the right age and character in New Zealand and so the piece is effectively destroyed.

Compounding the disappointment of the destruction of much loved pieces of furniture is the Insurance process. You are advised to provide the full replacement value of your items at destination. This I did, and was charged a premium based on the value I had given. My claim was paid on the basis of the second hand value NOT INCLUDING the cost of transporting the replacement item from the UK to New Zealand. Neither of the destroyed items is replaceable in New Zealand and so if I had been going to replace them I'd have had to pay extra to transport them here. This is not consistent with 'the full replacement value of the item at destination.'

A further disappointment was the £100 administration charge for the claim.

While each of these provisions, apart from the cost of transport to the destination, is set out in the insurance contract, it is not clear that the basis of valuation in a claim will be the second hand value and not the new replacement value.

Probably what hurt the most however, was the sheer stupidity and negligence of whoever packed a glass coffee table in a crate after taking it apart, and a fragile glass mirror in nothing more than corrugated cardboard despite the clear instruction that it, together with the rest of the dressing table, should have been crated. The carelessness with which beloved items of furniture was treated belied the initial promise of a personal approach by a long established family firm. I felt cheated and let down by PSS Removals and I would not recommend them to anyone.

Move size: 1 Bedroom Home Service cost: £5722

PLEASE READ BEFORE USING PSSINTERNATIONAL as I clearly did not do enough research. I am leaving an honest review of my experience with PSS and mainly their attached insurance company (Removal Claims Service is a trading name of Basil E. Fry & Co. Limited). While PSS initially maintained a very positive and responsive service, after I enquired about a quote I was called just about everyday. Then once I confirmed the first payment and forms was lucky if I was called, even when I needed to be. At that point I had to contact them. The movers were incredible, packing and moving out stuff within 1 day. After they move your stuff, and your stuck, the real problems continue. PSS claimed that our belongings would arrive between 5-9 weeks, however due to unfortunate timing, the shipment arrived in NYC around Easter time, 9 weeks from the day it left our flat. What they don't clarify is that they are only going to be sure to ship your belongings between 5-9 weeks. PSS could care less when it arrives. It was then held up in customs due to the Easter holidays, so we were landed with another $700 bill, which we were not told to expect. After being without out items for over 10 weeks and then having to pay the $700, the real problems bega with the insurance company. PSS has you fill out a form to list and price each article you are bringing over based on how much you paid for the item, then when you go to claim, they find the cheapest Ebay item possible, (without taking into consideration shipping, which can be £30+) and offer you that amount and do not budge. They also then charge you 100 to use the claim service after having already charged you for taking out an insurance policy. I have found they take advantage of you when you're already in a stressful situation moving country, they are not transparent about things, do not prepare you for the extra costs of insurance, and the cost of having your items stuck, (because of having a shared container with others it is out of your control). I have been very disappointed with the aftermath of this service.

Move size: 2 Bedroom Home Service cost: £4800