Shipping company review

I just thought I'd post about my recent experience as I know I was clueless when looking for a shipping company.

 used www.upakweship.com and was really pleased with the service.

I moved from Philadelphia, PA to Pontefract, West Yorkshire. I forget how much I actually shipped, but they'll do 100 cubic feet for $995, with $2 extra per cubic foot for door-to-door service, (minimum $200) which is what I got.

What I was most impressed with was their customer service. A few days before I moved, Hurricane Irene hit, and I was without electricity/computer for 5 days prior to my things being picked up. I had to call several times  to facilitate the paperwork, etc. and the man that helped me (Chris Corder) couldn't have been nicer. I was *freaking out* and he was calm and told me not to worry, that we'd get it done in time for the pick up.

A big UPS truck picked up my stuff. I signed and off it went. It took 8 weeks for my things to arrive. I was kept informed each step of the way through the shipping process.

When it arrived, three men carried my boxes through my front door and into my living room. I was suprised, as I thought it was just going to be put on the curb/driveway.  They were pleasant and very fast. I had 15 boxes and 3 VERY large tubs and it was all done in about 10 minutes.

I shipped mostly clothing and breakables, with some books, CD/DVDs and a good bit of  office supplies as well. Two things were broken when they arrived, but  I could see both were my fault entirely for not wrapping them up well enough (very minor/inexpensive things, so I wasn't bothered).

I got an email to follow up that everything was to my satisfaction, etc.

Again, all in all a very pleasant and positive experience.

Like I said in other post, this is great for people who can pack for themselves and I like how you have more options n shipment size. Price wise it seems to be about average per cubic feet but some companies will do all of the packing for the same cost.

I want to save every 100 dollars that I can but since we can't pack ourselves and it would cost maybe 300.00 extra to be packed, well in the overall cost of moving this doesn't seem so bad.

I'm not sure but it seems that once you go over 500 cubic feet you won't save much because you will have a 20' container.

I'm not sure but it seems that once you go over 500 cubic feet you won't save much because you will have a 20' container.

I ended up with 760 cubic feet of stuff and ended up with a "shared container" so I didn't have to pay for the 20' container! It was great, and I had a lovely experience with upakweship.

That is good. Now if only they would provide the option of someone packing.

Thanks for the recommendations on the upakweship site. I will certainly be checking into it. It's nice to know that not everyone out there is out to rip you off. 

Here is what makes this ripe for bad quality service and fraud. I contacted Rainier in Seattle, they were very good to talk to. They hooked me up to the local movers who I guess would do the actual moving and Rainer would be at the destination people? Anyway, the movers are really Mayflower. A few days ago, all I saw with a quick search is that Mayflower is AWFUL.

Two questions: If Rainier are so good, wouldn't they care that Mayflower is rotten if they truly are? Has anyone had direct experience with Mayflower?

The company we ended up selecting was Stevens International. I found their name on the movingscam.com forums, and they did a really good job for us. When our stuff was picked up in KY, it was done by United. I have moved previously with United, so felt comfy with them. On this side (the UK) of the pond, the agent was IMove International. They did a really good job, besides a small hiccup with our actual delivery date.

We are actually using them both to move us back to the US.

We considered Upakweship, but I was just too put off by the inconsistent reviews on this forum and others. It does make me wonder now if they would have been cheaper!

Thanks for telling who you used and liked. I will contact them as I need a few more quotes. I know what you mean about conflicting reviews but there were so few responses about moving companies altogether! This is why I think it is important to keep this topic specific and up to date.

Just for info for others. I have been told that Mayflower international could be altogether different than domestic branch? Not sure but I think most of the terrible reviews were on their domestic moves.

Just to share info so other can get an idea.

These prices do not include insurance.

Premier Worldwide-w/o in-home survey and based on 900 cubic feet-$8,750

Rainier-1014 cubic feet after in-home survey-$8,350.00

Suddath-1000 cubic feet, in-home survey-$7,991.00

Southern Winds, 1000 cubic feet (I told them 1000)-$8,285.00

Stevens-in-home survey, 1000 cubic feet-$10,441.00

A local man did the survey for two companies and they responded with different cubic feet!

I played the surveys on the conservative side and will be thinning out more so the final price should be based on less. I'm focusing on Rainier, Suddath and Southern Winds. I'm going alot on how communicating by phone and email go.

I remain totally confused by if it is more to ship things over or leave behind and buy new. Some people say every thing costs more in UK, some say it doesn't. I also don't have a way to ship things over after we are there. We also won't be travelling back and forth. Very unlikely I could sell enough things and/or for enough money to justify leaving it behind and then needing to pay to have it removed when we are ready to sell the house.

Back in June, we packed a 40 foot container and shipped it to Liverpool for $4400, including road transport from Richmond to Norfolk VA and from Liverpool to Congleton, Cheshire. This also included the clearing agent fees on both ends.

You get 2 hours to load a container - and if you plan the load well, and have the right help, you can do it. After the 2 hours, our company charged $80/hour for the 'overage' so if it takes a bit longer, not the end of the world. On this end, you get 3 hours to unload.

A 40 foot took a 3BR house, a lifetime of personal stuff, and my husband's tools (enough to fill a section of Home Depot). How close are you to a port? These prices for 1000 cubic feet seem ridiculous to me - I would call a shipping agent/container firm.

I used Stevens International after reading how great they were on several websites, and I found their service to be absolutely terrible. I was told it would take 6-8 weeks to receive my items, and it took just over 5 months! I know other people have had positive experiences with them, but I definitely didn't.

They sent a local moving company to handle the packing, and everything was fine with that. The woman that handled the scheduling was very friendly. I was told by Stevens International that my items would leave out of Los Angeles/Long Beach, but when I contacted them after 2 months, enquiring about the location of my items, I was told everything was sitting in their warehouse near the Port of Houston. They claimed there were no shipping containers available for my shipment. I worked in logistics, so I understand how international shipping works, and had booked my move 2 months before I left, so I didn't understand how they hadn't arranged a spot for my belongings in a shared container beforehand and how they hadn't found space in the past 2 months for my belongings. I kept asking about every 2 weeks where my belongings were, and they kept saying there were no containers available. FINALLY after over 4 months, they told me my belongings were on a ship. If they had taken any longer, they would have been in Houston for a huge hurricane, and apparently the area around where my items were being stored was flooded. They didn't tell me when my items arrived or when they cleared customs, ignoring my emails (probably annoyed with me after I had emailed them so frequently, but I was VERY annoyed with them), and I was only given a day's notice that my items would be delivered. They didn't tell me anything about what I needed to do to prepare for the shipment. I did tell them how difficult it would be if a large truck was sent, though. I lived in the middle of Edinburgh on a tiny street, and as I had very few items, I assumed they'd send a van instead of a full-sized truck. Well, there was a full sized truck that couldn't even get down my street, so my husband had to carry everything around the block. The movers refused to help, as they claimed I hadn't informed anyone that the truck couldn't make it down the street. My boxes were completely smashed, but luckily only a few Ikea plates were broken.

I'll never move a large shipment ever again, after that experience!

Vadio-- If I may ask, can I ask you to fill in a few details regards your move--did you deal directly with a shipping company and did they bring the container to your house and then back to the terminal?  Can you provide the name of the company so I can compare apples to apples.  I'm in London now and need to get my stuff from Philly over here (going back over soon to facilitate it).

Many thanks--

Back in June, we packed a 40 foot container and shipped it to Liverpool for $4400, including road transport from Richmond to Norfolk VA and from Liverpool to Congleton, Cheshire. This also included the clearing agent fees on both ends.

You get 2 hours to load a container - and if you plan the load well, and have the right help, you can do it. After the 2 hours, our company charged $80/hour for the 'overage' so if it takes a bit longer, not the end of the world. On this end, you get 3 hours to unload.

A 40 foot took a 3BR house, a lifetime of personal stuff, and my husband's tools (enough to fill a section of Home Depot). How close are you to a port? These prices for 1000 cubic feet seem ridiculous to me - I would call a shipping agent/container firm.

Hi
I would like to give some very positive feedback about EuroUSA as we have recently completed our move back after 5 years from the Birmingham UK area  to Pennsylvania.  Like UPak at the US end, EuroUSA in the UK was a pack it yourself option which cost less than all of the other options (and beat some quotes by almost half--although none of these were totally pack it yourself options).  We also felt we could give more care and attention to packing our things and make better economical use of space by having the time to do it ourselves.
After having received several quotes from other companies, we knew we needed a 20 ft container for household belongings.  The cost of the container was just under 2800 GBP  (but with the xray final costs came in at 3000 GBP. My phone calls and emails were always answered promptly by Chris Smith and he was always helpful and calming answering questions about the move.
As planned, the container showed up on the morning of the 10th of Dec and we had 3 hours to load with our friend's help. We then attached a seal which couldn't be opened outside our our presence. The container was then taken to the port of Liverpool, set sail on the 15th, docked in port in Chester (Philadelphia) on the 26th and after the holidays and an xray, which I was told affects 85% of incoming containers and did cost $347 USD, the load was brought to our door.  We checked the seal and broke it open.  We unloaded in just over 1 hour (but we were actually allowed 2 hours for unloading)
There was some confusion by the Air and Shipping company at the US end of things about when the container would actually clear port and arrive and a question about extra fees, but a couple of emails to Chris sorted it all out.
Another interesting thing I was told is that moves from UK to US is just based on space usage but moves from the US to UK have a weight factor in addition to space.
Anyway, we were very pleased with the company, with Chris Smith especially, and would highly recommend them.

We just moved from London to a NJ suburb of NYC.  We used Stevens International.  We had 200 cubic ft. and had them pack and unpack, door to door.  Cost was around $2400 plus insurance.  Stevens service was excellent, as was the admin of their UK partner IMove.  The problem came with the packers IMove sent.  They were very quick and when we unpacked we discovered why, things were thrown in boxes with no padding.  We had over $1000 of damage to a MAC , bakeware and some photos.  The fragile things made it fine, they had just been careless with what they didn't consider fragile.  The claim was handled very well and we are happy with the service, just not the packers...

oh gosh, sorry to hear about the breakages ncny,  i am really happy to report that absolutely nothing was broken in our move and we had loads of dishes and pottery we packed.....
the speed of it all was what really took us by surprise, as the whole process of shipping and receiving took just over 3 weeks total!  i had paid for excess baggage services as i didn't want to be without things for months (i had read many stories about people waiting and waiting for their containers) and am sorry to have wasted that money as i had barely gotten those bags unpacked by the time the container had arrived!
anyway, international moving can be stressful but at least having a good company can help ease that stress...