Professional moving company

HA! Not so very professional with World Wide Van Lines.

I’ve never dealt with a moving company before, and hope never to again. Maybe I expect too much from professional businesses. Like them being professional.

The process to move Mom’s household items began with many quotes from moving companies and then my choice of World Wide Van Lines on April 6th with a several hundred dollar deposit. This I followed up with the requested inventory list which took some time as not everything in the house would be moved. Turned out to be approximately 4200 pounds so I overestimated to 5000 pounds for the quote. Better to get a credit than be shocked at the delivery point.

Date for pickup set the day before we were to fly to Arizona, Mom’s new home state. (A completely different and unfinished story.)

Written in the signed contract World Wide Van Lines states, “Services contracted constitute delivery of a licensed insured professional moving company trucks on, before or after your estimated move dates…  Client is aware of a 48 hour pick up window of the date shown and the following 24 hours.”

OK, the World Wide Van Lines’ professional movers would show up Tuesday or the preferred Wednesday, or possibly on Thursday after we flew out. A gracious neighbor held the house key and second payment check.

Monday evening the World Wide Van Lines’ nightmare began with a call from dispatch giving Wednesday morning as our pickup. So far so good. Then Tuesday evening the professional driver called to say he was in Pensacola (I think that’s Florida) and couldn’t make his delivery there until morning. Then he’d be on his way to us by Thursday morning. I gave him contact information to keep in touch with the neighbor and me.

After a 5am security check at the dinky Harlingen, Texas airport complete with Mom standing up from a wheel chair and being patted down, we were the last to board. Then while waiting to board in Houston I called the neighbor to check on the move and was told the professional World Wide Van Lines’ driver had called to say he’d fallen asleep behind the wheel and wrecked his truck but would be there in the evening.

Does this sound a little fishy? Me too, but you must remember my brains were on overload due to working on all the logistics of this move for over three weeks. And then there’s my mother.

Friday morning (my breaking day) when I called the neighbor for a move update I’m told that the driver called Thursday evening from Houston and would be there in 7-8 hours. I told the neighbor not to let the movers in or give them the check payment. I called the professional World Wide Van Lines’ driver and told him to stop, no pickup, no entry and no money. Then left two messages with the person I’d been dealing with at the company office. Please remember that was on Good Friday when I suppose professional moving company employees don’t work.

I kind of had the weekend off and hope all of you had a blessed Easter.

After no weekend response from World Wide Van Lines, I called Monday and complained about the driver and their lack of professionalism. I repeated the story to a supervisor who told me it would be looked into and he’d call me back. (Not yet anyway.)

I also put a stop to the order. Circumstances have changed and the move will be much smaller than World Wide Van Lines’ minimum of 2000 pounds for a hefty balance due. I sure could use that deposit money to rent a small U-Haul trailer.

Along this moving nightmare journey I’ve heard many people judge the professional moving business as many things, and none of them are professional. Just saying.