My Universal Movers

I wanted to update to say that my credit card company refunded the charge on this transaction with no questions asked. If you get scammed by this «company,» you won’t have any problems disputing the charges. Your credit card company will believe you.

I had a move scheduled with another moving company for a Sunday evening and they never showed up!!! Luckily, I reached out to Abdul with My Universal Movers. He was able to schedule me for 7am that Monday morning. The guys showed up promptly and moved everything in exactly 2 hours. The cost was very reasonable, in line what other companies quoted me. There was only a $ 20 charge for booking for less than 24 hour notice — not a big deal at all. Very pleased with my experience.

I would give negative stars if I could. BUYER BEWARE!!! Purchased a groupon from this company was told to make reservation via email. Thought that was odd but alright. Gave date, time, locations, length of groupon offer, run down of items, layout of homes, and was very clear about saying I required packing services including saying that I do not have supplies. Reservation was confirmed fairly soon after. Upon arrival, movers had no packing supplies. They seemed to have been contracted out based on conversation we had. They called Abdul Chambers who told me it was my responsibility to provide supplies. Had I known in advance I would have is what I replied. He seemed like he didn’t really care one way or another. So I run out to get supplies and upon my return the movers said they were instructed to have the clock running while I was gone. One hour and the cost of supplies up in smoke! Then comes the contract that says they charge per flight of stairs and other hidden fees not previously mentioned. I was really ill that day so I just signed but took a picture first. NO COPY WAS PROVIDED TO ME! Movers were actually decent guys but I told them they needed to find another employer when all was said and done. They even offered to help me find another moving company to take over! After all was said and done, they asked me for a credit card to serve as a receipt. I’m going to repeat that. After all was said and done, they asked me for a credit card to serve as a receipt. I told them groupon was already refunding me my money and there was no way I was going to provide a credit card on a blank receipt.
Now I was content with just a refund and wasn’t going to review negatively until I started getting LinkedIn requests and now some other sort of networking site request. Abdul Chambers is pretty much spamming me. So enjoy this awful review! I will post it everywhere I am able to do so. Abdul if you’re reading, if you send me one more piece of unsolicited communication, I will file a cease and desist then will sue you for court costs and every cent I can squeeze from you for damages.

I bought my living social coupon before checking Unilocal,and I have to admit I was a bit worried. I called Abdul, and he said to email him with all my info. It took a day or two to get a reply, but I got my appointment set up fairly easily — the communication by email eliminated a lot of the issues other reviewers have had setting up an appointment. My needs were simple — I wanted my heavy furniture/​boxes moved for me, and I could take care of the delicate stuff on my own. My movers were Ron and Quincy, and they were fantastic! There was a $ 10 extra charge per washer and dryer, but that is understandable — plus Ron went through the contract and let me know before they started. I can’t say enough good about Ron and Quincy — they were polite, quick and honest and I would request them in the future.

Why oh why didn’t I read Unilocal before I hired these guys?!
All the bad reviews here sound so familiar. Not showing up on time, not showing up with standard professional moving equipment, not taking responsibility for damages, saying we should have bought insurance when it was never offered, rude treatment and multiple versions of stories from Abdul. My story has them all, too.
In our case, when the first crew didn’t show up, Abdul subcontracted to someone whose crew, while very nice and hardworking, accidentally put a 12″ hole in our wall. I saw it happen and it could have happened to anyone. They were very apologetic and said they would get it fixed. They told me to call Abdul while they were there to tell him about it. He said he would send someone to look at it and not to tip the guys who had done it.
Well, he didn’t send anyone else over to look at it and we later learned that he told the guy who did it that he wouldn’t get paid unless he fixed it. That guy didn’t have the necessary sheetrock skills or the funds to pay someone else to do it and Abdul refused to take responsibility — telling us to file on our homeowners insurance, refusing to share any of his insurance information and telling us we should have signed up for insurance when the crew presented us with paperwork. Well, the crew never presented any paperwork. In fact, I never got the email that Abdul said he sent either, so there was never any written contract to force him to honor (my bad on that).
Oh, and the other dumb mistake I made was giving him my credit card number to hold the appointment. Now I’m charged what he claims was «the coupon price» even though I didn’t purchase through LivingSocial or Groupon or anyone — just called him and took the first offer he made me because it was $ 50 less than the best I’d found anywhere else. Yes, you get what you pay for — and then some, since I’m left paying out of my pocket more to fix what they damaged than I paid them to move my furniture in the first place.
Hopefully, you’re smarter than me and you’re reading this before thinking of working with them. Save yourself the potential frustration and pay a little more for someone more professional.

TL;DR version: Stay away. Stay FAR away. Each time I talked with Abdul, the story changed. My SERIOUS recommendation is to record every conversation you have with him.
Call #1: I found a LivingSocial deal for $ 99 for 2 hours of service (including a truck). I called To see if they had availability on the date I needed to move – and they did! Abdul was very sweet and said that he could honor the deal on his end, so that I didn’t need to go back to the LivingSocial site.
He also talked me through various options: I was moving via UHaul pods, and I could either do a full-​service move from my apartment to the UHaul place or have the pods delivered (for an extra fee) and have the movers load the pods right outside the apartment. He said he’d have to charge me an extra $ 25 for the travel, so we decided to book just 2 hours of loading, no travel. I’d find a friend with a pickup and tow the pods to my place myself.
I hung up feeling good about everything – confident that I had gotten a good deal. A couple days later, though, I saw that Abdul charged me $ 125, which wasn’t what we had agreed upon.
Call #2: None of my pickup-​driving friends could help me, so I called to see if My Universal Movers could do the travel to the UHaul place – Abdul had charged me the extra $ 25 anyway, so why not?
As soon as I got on the phone with Abdul, the story changed: I’m out of their service zone, which is why he charged $ 125. He should be charging much, much more. To do the travel to the UHaul place (a whopping 3 miles!), it would cost an extra $ 200 and require a minimum of 3 hours, not 2. He had zero recollection of our previous conversation, and none of his notes aligned with what he had initially told me.
After arguing with me for 20 minutes, he said that if I was unhappy with the service, he would cancel my reservation and I could go with another company. I wanted to ensure that I could get another company for a comparable price (spoiler alert: not difficult!), so I told him to leave the reservation for the time being.
A couple days later, after booking with another company, I sent him an email and asked to get a refund. I heard nothing.
Call #3: Almost a week after sending the email, I called back to verify that Abdul had received it and would process it. This time, Abdul let me know that he doesn’t do refunds for coupons – but MAYBE he could do me a favor and refund all but a cancellation fee ($ 25).
I reminded him of our previous (less-​than-​pleasant) conversation, and he said that he’d check with his manager about getting me a full refund (with a side of passive-​aggression) – «I mean, it’s not like it’s that much. It’s only $ 125. And we put out this ad to for the community, as a service to the community. But some people just want to keep taking advantage of us, and then try to make it seem like we’re taking advantage of them. It’s not like we’re even making that much on these services.»
Well, Abdul, I’m happy to save you the trouble of moving my stuff.

DO NOT USE THESE MOVERS!
Abdul told me I was wasting his time by asking about a potential time to move my move date. He indicated that I was wasting everyone’s time and that I should call back when everything was definite.
When I went to cancel my move because of horrible customer service, he hung up the phone on me 3 times telling me that he cannot refund my $ 350 dollars. He said it was a business and that he does not have time for this.
DO NOT buy the living social from this… its the only way there people can make money.
I am now disputing my transactions and am very upset with the outcome.

Here’s my experience on this «professional» moving service…
I needed a moving company for a Friday afternoon and My Universal Movers was available so I paid $ 250 up front for 3 hours of service. I should have checked Unilocal before I booked with them. I spoke with Abdul and at first he was extremely friendly and scheduled me for 4pm. Friday 4:30pm came and no movers were in sight. I called Abdul was told they were running behind and that they would be available at 7pm. I had plans at 7 so I was very upset already. I asked them to come at 11pm so I wouldn’t have to cancel my Friday night plans. I was ready at my apartment at 10:45 but the moving truck did not show up until 12:30am. They did the move in one hour and 15 minutes. One of the men was a little unprofessional in the way he spoke to me.
The next day a neighbor at my new apartment complex asked me about my move. His motorcycle had been moved 20 feet from where he had parked it, and there was damages, as if it got severely hit by a truck.
I also found some pretty bad dents and scratches on my kitchen chairs…
So Monday morning I decided to call the company to dispute the charge, and ask for at least a partial refund. I think its a reasonable assumption that a service company would be concerned about their customer’s experience. Abdul didn’t seem to care.
I called and explained the situation. As I explained the situation, Abdul continued to speak over me. When I said «The movers didn’t show up until 12:30» he spoke over me saying «We were there at 11. We called and left messages.» They did call and leave messages at around 10pm, but I was busy then. When I said «I am the customer, would you please let me speak,» Abdul hung up on me. I attempted to call him back two more times, but I got no answer.
Professional? I guess we’re all entitled to our own definition.

Seems as if my experience and list of complaints with My Universal Movers replicates almost everyone else who used this SHADY company!
EXTREMELY POOR CUSTOMER SERVICE!!!
I hired these movers a couple of weeks prior to my move date and pre-​paid for 2 hours which was not an agreement, but they asked for my credit card. They showed up to my house late. Once they arrived to my house they asked for the same credit card information before even packing the moving truck. I thought they needed to verifly the actual credit card, not that I would be charged again!
Once the movers got everthing in the truck and delivered I was informed that it would be an extra 100 dollars (additional fees) by the mover and that he could only take cash for this and was not able to add it to the card. The movers had taken over 5 hours to practically move the equivalency of one bedroom house. It was after 11pm and I wanted to get them the hell out of my new house!!!
The movers scratched several pieces of furniture. They ripped a large hole from top to bottom on my box springs. On top of all of this, the movers left a box in the moving truck that was like pulling teeth to get from the driver.
Still trying to regain my belongings 3 days after the move. I called the «manager/​owner «Abdul to straighten these issues out. He first asked me why I left the box in the truck. Probably because I wasn’t going to crawl in a large moving truck, in the dark of night (after 11pm) with two men waiting outside for me to inspect a service I had expected them to follow through with in the first place!!! Abdul told me he had fired the guy and called the police to get a report so he could get the property «Bonded». I called the police myself and they had no record of any type of report.
After several of phone calls to the Abdul (most of which ended with him hanging up on me) I asked for the owners name and number, yet once again was hung up on. Later in the day, I was told by the «manager» that the gentlemen no longer worked for his company due to this incident AND since the guy no longer worked for My Universal Movers it wasn’t his problem and felt he didn’ t need to call the police.
He aslo claimed he was unable to do anything about the furniture issues and the moving company will not replace anything unless it is was actaully broken. I feel that this company needed to be reported so I have also contacted the BBB!

Do NOT book with this company. I purchased a deal on Tippr for $ 99. I was told that they will not honor the deal because it is a mis-​print. They told me to contact Tippr to get a refund.
I then looked for other sites with moving company deals and found the SAME deal on living social. I called Universal Movers to ask if they would honor that deal and he said no, it was another mis-​print! Come on, you are obviously scamming people, just print an HONEST deal, and save everyone the headache.
The best part is he hung up on me, after saying he was tired if dealing with «cheap people.» I’m more than happy to be paying full price at an honest company that treats me with respect. If you are looking for a nice, honest, and good moving company with great rates check out

This was a wonderful experience. Manager Abdul worked with me to get me a very good rate and he and his movers were extremely communicative throughout the whole process. They arrived on time and were able to move everything in the time allotted so I didn’t have to pay extra. They were careful with my belongings and everything arrived as it left.
I had them move my things into storage and then out of storage to my new home in Houston. They were very polite and professional and I was able to make this move happen well under budget. I felt so comfortable with them after the first move (when I use a groupon) that I was thrilled they could move me to Houston. I felt secure that everything would run smoothly and it did!

Edit: Groupon has refunded me based on the terrible customer service! Take that jerk face!
ABDUL IS DISRESPECTFUL AND RUDE. I HAVE BEEN TRYING SINCE APRIL 9, 2013 TO SCHEDULE A MOVE AND THEY DO NOT ANSWER THE PHONE NOR DO THEY RETURN MESSAGES. I finally go through and they had a perfect time slot for me and my schedule, then he found out I have a Groupon. Suddenly that slot was booked??? There is not an option to book on line, so I know i wasn’t the case… I GAVE THEM A 3 DAY WINDOW TO GET MY STUFF MOVED AND THEY SUDDENLY HAVE NO TIME, OR THEY HAVE TO HIRE OUT, WHICH WILL COST ME MORE. WHY??? If you sell Groupons and deals, you need to cover the additional expenses to ensure good customer service. I will fight Groupon to the death about the money because now I had to pay for ANOTHER mover to move my belongings 3 miles away. I do not need you to pack or anything, just do they heavy lifting. I went on faith to purchase the Groupon, and did not read the reviews. BOY, WAS I WRONG!!! This company is terrible. Funny thing, I had a male friend call, and he was courteous and a polite as he could be. Sexist much???
EDIT: they are attempting to fool people by having 3 Unilocal review pages!!! NICE TRY!

We just recently used these guys for a local move in Austin. We had a Groupon so it seemed like a great deal and we went for it. I got the 2 guys and a truck for 4 hours deal. Here is my experience:
Move was scheduled for 2pm in the afternoon. The guys showed up at 4:15pm instead which then meant that we would be cleaning up the old place till the wee hours of the morning since we couldn’t do it until it was empty. But they did say there were sorry for being late. So that was nice. The previous move apparently ran over and was a tough one so the guys had been carrying stuff all day and were pretty worn out by the time they got to our place. So make sure you book the morning time slot if you use them.
In the Groupon it says that if there are heavy items such as pianos, pinball machines, bars, etc. there would be an extra charge. In reality what they did the first thing they got into our place was to try to charge extra for every item bigger than a box. So if you have dressers, bookshelves, armoires, buffets, or other common furniture they will want to charge $ 20 extra for each! I fought back with the a little so they dropped some of the extra charges but we had no items comparable to a piano or pinball machine. Not even close and thus should not have been paying any extra charges for this. Also, just so you know they charge extra for every flight of stairs involved in the move. And there is a rescheduling fee incase you had to do that. Abdull does not mention it at the time of reschedule, it comes up at the time of payment.
When it comes to the actual moving of stuff. These guys are not careful at all. The insurance they offer only reimburses $ 0.60/pound of stuff destroyed. So a broken dinner plate that weighs ½ pound would get you $ 0.30 reimbursement from insurance. What a great plan. Save you money on that one. During our move the following was destroyed:
1. They put a ~20 inch scratch on a desk surface. This happened while they were loading boxes on top of the desk without a pad on it. There was a pile of pads about 3 feet away and it puzzles me still why professional movers would not cover the desk with a pad before loading boxes on it.
2. They ripped off sections of 2 bookshelves without first opening the screws. So they just pulled the screws out with whatever wood came with it and now they cannot be reattached.
3. They dropped a whole box of dinnerware off the truck. Everything inside the box was broken and these plates and cups were not the cheapest kind. The box said «FRAGILE» on every side of it. Apparently it didn’t mean much to these guys.
So after when we were done and it came time for billing the guy asked me if I wanted to include a tip. I said an amount that I though was appropriate but apparently wasn’t good enough for him. He very directly expected a minimum $ 30 per person tip after showing up over 2 hours late and after destroying hundreds of dollars worth of stuff.
So that was my experience. Needless to say, I will not be using these guys for another move… ever…

Unmarked truck, different addresses listed for this business, no physical address on their website, refusal to give a receipt, they won’t give you a copy of the sham they call a contract, overcharged for fees, lied to, boxes tossed without care… the list goes on.
It should come as no surprise this is business is not BBB accredited, it has a rating of F and has had 7 complaints filed against it with the BBB, including my own.
I wrote a full review of my experience and attached some pictures of the damage… on their other Unilocal page, which I think was created with a different physical address to try and get away from all the awful reviews here. On another site (Citysearch) I found a positive review made by the owner, posing as a customer.
If you value your posessions, and being treated with a modicum of respect, you will not use this company. Please be warned! They are not legitimate! And don’t let your friends or family fall prey to these deceptive business practices either. They only add to the stress of moving ten-​fold. Absolutely awful. The icing on the cake… to add insult to injury… the owner, Abdul Chambers, (after his company destroyed my leather couch, damaged a handful of other things and refused to return my calls) had the audacity to add me on Google+. Wow. I’m without words. Well, almost.

THESE ARE THE MOST DISHONEST UNETHICAL «BUSINESS PEOPLE» YOU WILL EVER DEAL WITH. I MEAN SCUM!!!
I needn’t write a review. Just read all the awful ones below. My experience pretty much mimics the others. Groupon, not showing up etc. They were an hour late so, naturally, I called.
«Abdul» basically called me a liar over the phone and said my appointment was on a different day, according to his email. WRONG, YOU DUMBA#$!!! I resent the original confirmation email to him proving him wrong. Of course, I didn’t get moved. We will get our money refunded.
HOW DO THESE PEOPLE STAY IN BIZ? WHY DO LIVING SOCIAL AND GROUPON CONTINUE TO DEAL WITH THEM?

I was extremely pleased with My Universal Movers. I purchased a deal for 2 hours of moving. I have moved quite a few times and was really just planning on using them to handle the big stuff. I was a little worried they would try to move slowly and get me to have to pay for an extra hour, but that was far from the case.
They were extremely nice and professional. They moved everything quickly and with care. They were running slightly late but they called to let me know and it gave me a little more time to pack up a few more boxes.
At one point, they realized they did not have a tool needed to unhook the washer and paused the «clock» while they went to buy one down the street. We had everything unloaded at the new place in just under 2 hours, so no extra time or hidden fees came up. I couldn’t have been more pleased with them. HIghly recommended.

Don’t do this to yourself! Like others I bought the voucher. That was my first mistake. And in the craziness of moving I failed to check the reviews. Below are the highlights of the worst moving experience ever.
The waiting
–They were over four hours late; had appointment scheduled at 2pm, showed up at 6:45pm. It was not just, we will come at 6:30pm after they missed (with out calling) the 2pm appointment
— There were at least five phone calls, asking us to reschedule for the next day (we did not have flexibility which is why we made an APPOINTMENT) Each call ended with «We’re on our way» and after waiting for 30 minutes to an hour following each call we’d have to call back to find out if they were still coming.
The «company»
–The Living Social deal was for «Universal Movers: Two Men and a Truck»… NOT affiliated with the real Two Men and a Truck, FYI
— One «employee» informed us that «we are not like a legitimate business,» after denying to provide us a copy of the contract we signed or a valid receipt
— They couldn’t tell us the name of their boss when we asked what manager we should speak to.
The «employees»
— Two of the men engaged in a verbal altercation and threatened violence towards each other while moving, waking our neighbors
— They told us they did not have insurance, hinting at either a threat of a lawsuit or asking us not to push them too hard, or both
— All three men took frequent smoke breaks and/​or phone breaks while moving (we’re paying by the hour!!!)
— They put large scratches in our new hard wood floors
— They dropped multiple boxes
The price negotiations
— They brought an extra employee in an attempt to get the move done quickly and informed us upon showing up there would be an additional fee for the third person despite the fact that we did not ask for him to be there and were not told about this up front.
— When we denied to pay them the extra money, we were threatened that, «oh, the manager will come get his money». A guy they couldn’t name just an hour before.
— After finally coming to a price agreement and paying and tipping the movers, I found a random $ 50 extra charge from the company on my credit card the next day. Key an eye on your statements!
The truck
–Broke down in front of the house (we suspect it ran out of gas) and couldn’t be driven around to our driveway to make unloading easy
–Had multiple holes that could leak (it was raining but fortunately had stopped when they were driving the truck)
— Did not have an interior light, so were loading/​unloading in the dark

Do no use My universal Movers off Avery Ranch or buy any of their groupon, livingsocial or any other deals. My experience:
Abdul the manager was very nice over emails scheduling our move so I thought it was going to be smooth. I confirm an appointment on the 19^th for the 26^th at 2:00pm. The 26^th comes around and I still have not had a verbal confirmation which was kind of weird but I gave them the benefit of the doubt since I still had the email confirmation.
2:20 pm rolls around and no call and no movers.
I call the # listed to find out what is going on. I am told the movers «should» be on their way to my house but he would give them a call and find out then call me back.
2:40 pm rolls up and still no call back so I call again wanting to know the status.
He tells me the movers are running 2 – 3 hours behind. In this 20 minute wait I google My universal movers and alas my 40 minute delay is just the beginning and a confirmation of how this Abdul runs his business.
So I say, «so it will be more like 5:00?» He says yes, «=so I asked to be called when they are on their way. 5:30 rolls around and still no call so I call again, of course I’m only talking about the phone calls in which I actually go through to someone. Most of the calls were sent to voice mail which vm was completely full. Go figure.
So 5:30, he tells me that the movers were still running behind and hadn’t even gotten to the appointment that was scheduled before me and he was trying to see if they were gong to make it that evening. At this point I didn’t even count on it but I remained nice and calm. Reading the other reviews Abdul gets very rude and heated so I saw no use in getting angry seeing how I actually did have flexibility in my moving.
10:15 pm my husband and I are in bed and I get a call from the actual mover. He says he could still do it tonight but if we could do it in the morning. I’m like yes I’m in bed we’re not moving now. He says he will call me at 7:30 am.
Finally the movers get to my house at 9:45 am. This of course is after calling many times, sending an email and just about to schedule different movers and just get refunded by groupon. They showed up just as I was calling another company. Since it was already paid I thought I would just let them move my stuff.
We picked up a couch at my sisters then onto our one bedroom apartment to pick up more, which by the way is on the way to our destination. This was all done within the 4 hour time frame. So the mover writes in that I need to pay $ 29 for a stop fee for the other stop. I told him no sorry I’m not paying that. One I was not told about this fee, two the manager can’t make up rules as he goes and THREE they were 19 hours and 45 minutes late from my moving appointment. I had already read reviews where he pulled this with other people so I was not going to buy into it.
I tipped the movers because they were actually good. Told the mover to tell Abdul to kiss my ass about the $ 29 fee he made up and he needed to find another «boss» because he’s only making him look bad.
Apparently Abdul is a shady business owner. He does all these groupon and livingsocial deals, makes appointments with people then never can keep the appointment and is 20 – 24 hours after the scheduled time. I’ve seen on reviews where he has made up fee’s for it being second floor, in my case it was an extra stop etc. He hires contractors to do the moving and over books people. I didn’t experience the other things that I’ve read but I don’t doubt it for a minute!
Abdul is SHADY!!!

DO NOT USE THIS MOVING COMPANY!!!
The movers stole from us and when we called to complain, the person on the phone laughed at our claims and said, «how are you going to prove that they took this stuff from you.». When I asked to speak with his manager he replied that he was the manager and that there was no one else in the whole company that I could speak with. This company is terrible and treats its customers with no respect! I have never put a review on Unilocal before but I got my own account just so I could post about my terrible experience with Universal Movers.

I’d love to give the movers a 5 star, but the company a 4. But since you can’t split ratings like that, I’ll stick to a 5…
My Universal Movers helped me moved out of a house I rented into a bedroom on the 2^nd floor. There were no odd charges for oddly shaped items or additional floors.
The company communicated well with me concerning times, and dates, and even did a call the day before to make sure everything was on schedule.
The movers were a little late, but they called me to let me know ahead of time that they’d be about an hour late. No issues there since the communicated.
The truck was a little sketchy, but it got the job done. The company really needs to fix up the truck a bit as this can mar their image. This was really the only issue at all.
I offered the movers water and helped them load/​unload my stuff. They did an excellent job with everything and we finished in 3 hours.
What else can I say? They did the job I needed them to do. I tipped them based off of the full price of service, not the discounted group-​on.