We were extremely impressed with your company. Communication was excellent. Samantha was a pleasure to work with at all times. The delivery team was very courteous and efficient. They kept us informed and arrived on time. They unpacked very efficiently. This was a very positive experience for us and we are happy to recommend the company to others.
International move from Germany to Eilat District.
AVOID THIS COMPANY !! It involves professional fraud with methods that ultimately costs the customer almost twice the agreed and contractually fixed transport price. Also many other customers made this experience with SONIGO, as a more intensive research on the Internet shows: In the end the price of the transport always comes out almost twice as high than agreed.
In my case (how likely in most cases) of a container transport from Berlin / Germany to Israel, the blackmail trick works like this:
As usual in Israel all services must be paid in advance, so that the full contract amount is already paid when the container reaches the port. At this point, SONIGO has already had a complete list of the container content and all the necessary personal documents of the customer for weeks. The embarkation in Rotterdam would not have been possible without these documents. All other import-related issues could then have been clarified by SONIGO in advance.
And this is exactly where the fraud process begins: SONIGO picks up the container one day after reaching the port and stores it on their own ground. This is possible by paying an average customs duty on private container imports until final clearance.
Now the customer is faked with all sorts of difficulties that prevent a fast delivery of his container. In my case, sudden missing the approval of the Ministry of Transport for an electric wheelchair, which later leads to lack of customs clearance, then again to different customs duties and ultimately looks like pure arbitrariness. Suddenly, all the necessary papers are missing, although these have been delivered to SONIGO weeks ago and several times as mentioned. Daily new problems with changing surcharges appear.
At the same time, the customer is falsely told that the container is still in the port, it would now produce daily harbor and Demurrage fees of nearly 100 € . As a result, there is growing pressure on a daily basis without any chance to get out of this situation.
To demonstrate the special perfidy of these "colleagues": I am a 100% handicapped wheelchair user whose entire mobility equipment was housed in the container. In fact, I was motionless in the literal sense of the word as SONIGO was squeezing extra profit out of me. To "confirm" the fraud, SONIGO only gave in after the immigration department was called by me and suddenly, SONIGO was ready to deliver the container for a "small" surcharge of more than € 2,000; an hour before the authority call they still wanted € 4,300!
At that time, more than 14 days after the arrival of the container in Israel, I was already completely exhausted and had to meet important health appointments. So I transferred the money, teeth grinding, and the container was delivered one week later in my absence.
All costs, including the extortion monies from SONIGO, have risen to almost € 10,000 for this 20 "container transport, instead of the contractual agreed 5700 € for the worst case scenario!
BTW: The role of the respective local supplier of SONIGO - in my case, the Berlin company HERTLING - seems also obscure concerning the above tricks and maneuvers: Questions about the integrity, reliability and honesty of SONIGO before the container shipping were always answered positively; but HERTLING did nothing to end this extortion process, even though they knew exactly that the container was no longer stored in the harbor!
All in all, this is a terrifying experience. The isaeli authorities should act as soon as possible against such methods to avoid further loss of image of Israeli ports.
it is very painful for me to read your letter which is why I have waited so long to respond....as you may remember, when you told me you had a electric scooter unit since you are disabled, I told you to bring on the plane with you - and you said you could not since you were bringing a motorized wheel chair on the plane.
Yours was the first time I have ever had someone with 2 motorized transport units and therefore this was the first time I learned a second unit is taxed at 17% (VAT only) since every previous time someone imported a motorized wheelchair it has cleared on a tax exempt basis.
So yes, it took us much longer to clear your container and in spite of your clear unhappiness, you did not mention how we spent a tremendous amount of time trying to get Rakefet Ishai (national head of Personal Import at Customs) to approve your import. Your daughter, Chana, was also very involved with these efforts as I am sure you remember.
I am particularly hurt you would write things like we performed tricks and cheated you in any way. That is not the way we work and for the record, the only "extra charges" were for Customs Duties, container storage and container detention or demurrage. These were *not* Sonigo charges and zero of your tax bill went to Sonigo, while a small percentage of storage and demurrage charges do go to Sonigo to cover our wire transfer, etc charges - as I wrote you in real time.
Again, I was very sorry it took so long to clear your shipment, but I want to assure you, in no way was there any tricking or cheating of any kind.
Hello -- We moved from the USA to Israel and had a full container come over. The movers we used to pack up did a FANTASTIC job. Once shipped, Sonigo kept us informed along the way. If we had qauestion, Sam Bassin and Nofar Malka were very responsive and clear.
Upon arrival in Israel, SONIGO staff took care of the customs issues as well as other details. The moving team unpacked us in 4-5 hours and no damage ensued. They assembled furniture and also hired a special assembler for our new furniture. Debris removal process was completed within 1-week of the unpacking.
We could not have been more pleased. Gratitude and appreciaion to SONIGO.
My move was from Jerusalem to Gaithersburg, MD. In Israel the salesman Shai was very nice when he was selling me on the company. All that changed once they had my money in advance of the international move. Even though English was the only language I ever spoke to all the people in the company, they sent me a Russian speaking only crew of 3 to pack my apartment. The packing was good, but they knew few English words to write on the boxes. Bedroom was not one of those words! Neither was living room or cabinet or closet. Everything says “decor”, obviously a non-word they used as miscellaneous. It is taking me forever to unpack and I am having to move boxes myself from room to room. The Russians with no English did not tell me they needed to take all the papers that day. They left them with me and both Ed and Shai refused to pick them up, even though Ed lives in Jerusalem and I offered to bring them to him. Instead he left insulting voice messages telling me I am a stupid old woman. Lovely company! I hope David Sonigo reads this. I would never recommend this company. I went to Israel with Rainier and I recommend them. My mistake for picking Sonigo. The delivery company from New Jersey Best Guy Moving and Amir who I dealt with were lovely, but they also were confused by the non-English on the boxes.
thank you for your detailed letter. I note and am pleased to see you wrote: "the salesman Shai was very nice," "the packing was very good," the delivery company from New Jersey... and Amir who I dealt with were lovely..." make it sound like you had a perfect move: a nice salesman, a quality packing crew and a solid delivery team. Of course I am sorry none of the crew spoke English...but it is not unusual in our business to find new immigrants working as movers.
I also checked into your claim about Ed - he told me he was trying to work with you to try and find a way, via a neighbor, to scan or photograph us the documents needed for Customs.
Bottom line, your actual move sounds perfect and deserving of a 5 star rating, with maybe a little discount for poor language skills (which is usually not a requirement for a move.)
The service we received was absolutely unacceptable. Many of our belongings were damaged, including broken pictures, warped albums and books, and a scratched dining table that was brand new. The packing was rushed and done unprofessionally, with items poorly wrapped and left loose in boxes, resulting in extensive damage.
Despite the clear negligence, the company refused to take responsibility. This is not what you'd expect from a professional service. Save yourself the heartbreak and avoid them.
I used Sonigo for my recent move from Dubai to Israel. From beginning estimate through to final delivery, the service was outstanding. I have moved my house 27 times in the last 30 years, including international moves to 10 different countries, and Sonigo is in the top 3 of all the global movers I have interacted with. Everything was done on or before time, nothing was damaged, and the cost estimate held perfectly. Response to queries was quick and helpful, too. Highly recommended!
This company pulled the classic bait and switch, estimating between 5-7 cubic meters, only to try and tell us the shipment ended up more than double the low estimate - 12 cubic meters. They threatened us, said we'd never see our possessions again, called us at all hours of the night to harass us - it was a nightmare. Plus, on their website, the show many affiliations with trade associations, etc - upon checking these out, most told us they had not been members, used to be but stopped paying, etc. Do not even consider using this scamming company for your move!
thank you for posting your message, although I wish you would have published the whole story. Two or three other companies also surveyed your home before your move and all of us estimated you had 5 - 6 cubic meters. During the packing, our crew chief reported you had more than 6 cubic meters. Your salesman, Joe Semel spoke to you or your wife 3 times during the packing to let you know you would be exceeding the expected volume and you continued to add more items. (Hard to call that bait and switch in my book.)
During the ongoing discussions after the packing, Joe offered to give you a $600 discount.
As you also know and I wish you would have mentioned, a court of law in Colorado ruled against you and said *you* had to pay the outstanding amount including our court costs and legal fees.
Finally, I wish you would have mentioned, we shipped and delivered your goods prior to getting full payment and you have still not paid what the court says you must.
Recently shipped some household contents/furniture,etc. from new York to Gush Etzion Israel. The staff at Sonigo was very helpful whether it was in filling out forms or answering questions. The movers in America were very professional and cleaned up after themselves. On the Israeli side the company was in contact with us about every step of the way. The movers on our side were very professional and helpful. We would defintiely recommend to others.
I realize that making Aliyah to Israel is both fulfilling and traumatic. Most of the trauma surrounds the transport of your entire life’s accumulated stuff 6000 miles across the globe. Our experience with Sonigo was trying, but ultimately very successful. Most of the thanks goes to our move manager, Shmuel Mantinband. He went above and beyond, to always be in contact, and to respond promptly and efficiently. Our items were delivered with only minor issues, which all seemed to be resolved quite miraculously. I guess that’s part of the Aliyah experience. Kudos to our packer, Schumacher Cargo, whose team packed and loaded a 40 foot HC container in a day and a half, and the four exhausted Jewish/French crew, who delivered to our apartment in a sweltering 8 hour day. Y’asher Ko’chachem!
Do not use sonigo unless you want movers to be wreckless with your things, cause thousands of dollars in damages to your property, lose many of your boxes, steal your things, and after all that have the audacity to charge you thousands in hidden fees only to never take responsibility for all the losses you've accrued through this frankly disgusting experience.
I am sorry you feel this way and only wish you would have told the whole story. I wish you would have mentioned that Sonigo, in the original offer, included the first $2,000 of your insurance policy. I even wrote you and *highlighted* the insurance company requirement for you to complete a valued inventory. And my colleague again wrote you reminding you to complete the valued inventory form and told you if you do not fill it out, you would have no coverage. And of course, in my quote, I wrote if you do not submit the valued inventory form, you do not have coverage.
You obviously made a financial decision to save the cost of the policy and did not ever complete the valued inventory so you knew up front you had no coverage and would be responsible for any loss of damage.
Furthermore, I offered to pay you for damaged items as per the amount we offer in our quote: $0.60 / cubic foot. Admittedly this is a small amount, but that is why most people take additional coverage.
You said you did not want this compensation which we declared up front, in advance of your confirming your move with Sonigo.
As you know the crew packed up everything you asked them to pack. If you did not tell them to pack something that does not mean it was stolen...it just means it was not packed or shipped.
Finally and this hurts personally when you state something so patently false. There was not one single cent charged that was not stated up front. There are *zero* hidden fees in my quotes as I know all the charges that are normally charged.
The only rarely incurred unknown charges are stated up front in my quote and include things like Customs Inspection, difficult access and long carry.
Finally Avromi, it would have been nice had you written you got an $800 DISCOUNT because I had an opportunity to switch your container from an exclusive one to a shared (consolidated) container.
Our experience was excellent. These kinds of moves from one country to another, are not simple and require professional people, who know their job. Biddulphs in S.Africa was one of them, and Sonigo (Ashdod) was the other. The communication was good, and once all the details were clarified, the delivery was made flawlessly. I have no problem in recommending Sonigo for your shipments to Israel.
You get a fair price quote but end up paying much more.
I would NOT recommend using Sonigo's shipping and moving services. You get a fair price quote but end up paying much more.
We've used Sonigo services to ship our furniture from the US (New-York) to Israel in August 2017. We had an inventory survey in which their company's representative came to our apartment and we've shown her all the stuff that will be shipped to get an estimated quote. We did it with several other shipping companies but decided to go with Sonigo because they seem to be the most reliable, even though their quote was among the more expensive offers. After packaging the furniture and sending it to the port, the end inventory volume came up 27% more than the estimated. That was around $1,300 more than the expected price! If it was 10%, I could get it, but almost 30% deviation is unacceptable. We were quite in shock because that's a lot of money and when we discussed it with Ed, Sonigo's rep, he started accusing us as if we hidden furniture from the survey. Not only that it wasn't the case and they refused to take responsibility, but we also managed to sell a bunch of things that were supposed to be originally shipped, so the final inventory was less than the expected. Since we were already out of the country, there was not much that we could do and we had to just "live" with it. Whether it was a miscalculation from the person that did the survey, or a terrible inefficient packaging of the movers, or an intentional bump in the price as we were captive clients, we declared everything and were transparent, and we shouldn't have "eaten" that extra cost. A company that respects itself and their clients would never act as Sonigo did. Hence, we will never use their services again.
As a side note, Sonigo works with "BestGuy Moving services" as a 3rd party provider in NYC for packaging the furniture and moving them to the port. The movers were unprofessional, messy (e.g., mixing a computer display from the office room with parts of a closet from the bedroom), and inefficient (many of the boxes were half empty). It took 5 people more than 6 hours to finish packaging a small 2-bed apt which could have been easily under 3.
When relocating from France to Tel-Aviv during the summer 2018 our French relocation company used Sonigo as the Local Agent.
It turned out to be a terrible experience where our shipment was blocked in Asdod port for more than 1 month while Sonigo was charging additional demurrage and storages fee's.
Sonigo completely mismanaged the custom clearance didn't plan the delivery and send a team to deliver the furniture who only spoke Russian. The worst relocation services I have ever experienced.
Threatened not to give us our goods if we didn’t pay more.
Moved goods from their warehouse in NJ to Israel. When they arrived at our home they mentioned that they were not aware of the items that we had or the weight even though they had packed the items. They claimed they needed a better moving truck to move these items as they were too heavy. Somehow they seemed to be content with the existing moving truck and had no trouble moving 2 heavier boxes off of the truck - but told us we needed to pay $800 more or else they would not unload the rest of our goods. Really a terrible experience on what is already a stressful day and should have been a more pleasant experience. There are a few other companies which are in the similar price range - please stay away from Sonigo.
We moved a 20" container with an overseas shipping from Houston Tx to Israel.
I can't recommend ENOUGH on Sonigo. The partner on the US side was informative, knowledgeable, communicative and friendly. The packing company was by far the best packers I've ever worked with- nothing broke on the way, everything was wrapped perfectly and packaged extremely carful. Arriving in Israel, midst Covid19 days, the Sonigo office in Israel was efficient, transparent, no surprises and no extra fees we didn't know about in advance.
To sum up, we had such a positive experience I feel the need to spread the word so others could enjoy it as well.
They are highly professional, know what they're doing, very experienced- this is the type of company you'd want to handle your life belongings.
**Important to mention I'm a private person, payed for the shipping etc. on our own (no corporate involved) and have no incentive to write this review other that true satisfaction from the service level**
STAY AWAY from Sonigo!!! They are the worst moving company on the planet!
We have just relocated to the US, and needeles to say how difficult and expensive this process is. We've used their services to ship our container. They told us that it would take a maximum of 9 week for the shipment to arrive from the moment it's picked up, never mentioning that there might be delays.
From the time they've picked up our stuff and we've paid, we didn't hear from them at all. After arriving to the US, they haven't communicated with us to let us know when should we expect our shipment, basically nothing.
We've had to chase them endlessly, without understanding what's going on. Eventually, we have heard from the moving company they work with here (which are also horrible!), saying that our shipment has been delayed because the ports are congested. Having said that, they made us pay $15 a day for every day our shipment is at the port, as there is no option to transport it.
They are extremely shady as they ask you to provide them with a credit card over email which you have no option but to do.
Weeks and weeks has gone by, and we're not able to get an exact or an estimated ETA on our shipment.
Finally, the moving company called us and said that the shipment will arrive to us in 24 hours (when there's a tropical storm, great!), but they have stated a fact that the 18-wheeler will not be able to access our community and that we need to pay an additional $350 for the movers to rent a small truck + labor.
I have double checked with our community manager, who have confirmed that an 18-wheeler can IN FACT access our community but they've decided, based on Google Earth only, that it can't and that's it- nothing we can do.
Sonigo had our address from the beginning, and they could have updated us in advance that there might be additional costs but they chose to do it in the last minute when we need to get our stuff & our hands are tied.
Sonigo has never bothered to update us that there may be further delays, and that there might be additional costs. They don't care about the client after the shipment is paid and sent.
14 weeks later, and still no shipment. Shame on them.
Shmuel kept us in contact regarding our shipment and we were very satisfied. The shipment came on time and even a bit early. Working with Sonigo has been a pleasure.
Shmuel and the Israeli team were exceptional to work with - responsive and informative. The final cost was actually lower than the original estimate (I guess I didn't buy enough).
Sonigo packers from the Miami area were professional and thorough; delivery in Israel was smooth and helpful. Everything arrived as it left, in perfect condition. This was a challenging time to bring in a shipment - every ship in the world was delayed. No reflection on Sonigo. These are not *normal* times.
My experience with the company was excellent and I recommend them highly.
Prior to speaking with Sonigo, we received a quote from another shipping company which was 40%(!) higher than the quote Sonigo gave us.
The actual payment ended up being almost exactly what they offered in the initial quote, which speaks to their expertise and fairness when providing the quote.
They connected us with a local company that provided great service, packing was super quick and professional.
Shipment arrived in less time than expected and we were continuously being informed about progress.
Finally, shipment to our home was coordinated with us, and the guys did it quickly and carefully. All of our stuff arrived in perfect condition.
I would wholeheartedly recommend Sonigo to anyone, they turned a potentially very stressful process into something we didn't have to worry about.
We just completed our move from Atlanta, GA to Israel—Thank G-D, Sonigo came through for us and the entire experience has been very positive. Pricing was fair and no surprises at the end. Movers on both ends, were first class. They did a marvelous job packing everything up in Atlanta and the team in Israel was extremely professional, courteous, and made us feel like they truly cared about us and our belongings. Shmuel and Alex were great points of contact along the way and answered whatever questions we had in a timely manner. So great to have everything in our new Israeli home and we truly appreciate the entire Sonigo team for actually making this big, international move a pleasant experience.
We paid full price for a complete package, from source to destination including packaging, disassembling of furniture, shipping the container, handling everything at destination, and reassembling.
However, the moving company at destination would not reassemble the furniture, they were not paid for it by Sonigo. So, we got stuck with disassembled furniture.
Sonigo simply does not care. A huge disappointment, and breach of contract.
Thank you, Shmuel , sonigo team, for your great service for my container from NY to Jerusalem my shipment arrived safely to its destination, and so, thank you for your past help in making it happen smoothly.
I hope you are well and getting more orders? Thanks to all at Sonigo too.
I can only review my case, but I found staff at Sonigo very helpful, and felt they did not neglect me in the process of my overall ten week absence of goods before delivery.
Noam was my main contact; very informative and helpful.
Their associate company in UK were also attentive.
We just completed our move from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania to Jerusalem, Israel. (January 2021) We were very pleased with the packers in America as well as the delivery personnel in Jerusalem. We received all of our belongings in excellent shape. We would highly recommend Sonigo to others who are contemplating such a big move.
Community testimonials, ratings and consumer reports on Sonigo - a professional company located in 6 Bnei Darom St. Industrial Area, Ashdod, SO, 4068. Discover Ashdod, Southern District moving companies.
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MoveAdvisor may not be affiliated with Sonigo. By selecting the link to the left, you will have to opportunity to either directly call or have other potential movers provide you with estimates.
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