A. Colonial Moving & Storage Co.

We hired this company to move us from New Jersey to Florida. In the beginning, they were very cooperative, even offering us free boxes. However, the day of the move was very deceiving. The driver, Hughey, did not review the inventory with us. He asked us to sign a barely legible «inventory only» sheet AFTER the entire truck was loaded. We did not realize that Hughey marked virtually every bit of our furniture as «worn» or «damaged». Our furniture is new. This tactic was to ensure that if his guys did damage anything, it would «already noted». IT IS IMPORTANT THAT YOU DISCUSS CONDITION WITH YOUR DRIVER PRIOR TO THEM LOADING. DO NOT SIGN ANYTHING WITHOUT READING IT OVER THOROUGHLY. It gets even better. Half way through the move, the owner, John Reynolds, calls me to tell me he has to increase their «guaranteed price». Yes, you read that correctly — increase guaranteed price. I told him no and John said he would work it out it out with the driver. Well, apparently the driver «worked it out» himself. Instead of driving our furniture to Florida, he drove it to Long Island and unloaded part of the shipment. We were told the furniture would never leave the truck once loaded. It turns out John Reynolds did even know this as he couldn’t tell us where our furniture was or what was removed. Once he got a hold of the driver, I was informed the balance of our shipment would be delivered a week later — BY ANOTHER DRIVER. It showed up late and beyond the contractually guaranteed date. We were new to long distance moves, but please avoid this company. No one should have to deal with such unprofessionalism. I have saved every email and voicemail regarding this matter should I decide to pursue litigation. I deal with contracts all day and I cannot believe even I got fleeced by this company. We never experienced such a feeling of helplessness. Be sure to place payment on a credit card. My threat of calling AMEX to reverse the charges was the only leverage I had to get a response. We had to walk on egg shells as the completely disorganized company had our furniture hostage. Google my name if you want the proof — Jason Nazzaro. My number and email is very easy to find.

I would run fast and far away from this place. At first John seemed nice. he gave me a price. They get to the house on moving day and tell me that it’s 50 $ to wrap a tv another price to wrap a china closet. then the movers complained that they had to move it up to the second floor. The worst things don’t stop at that. They dropped my 1800 $ fridge down a full flight of stairs. The put a whole in the wall at the place I was moving out. theyn they did not wrap my headboard and backboard and the dropped that also. All they could say is that it’s ok. I had dents in my fridge and it wasn’t” working right. My furniture was all scratched. Going to the new place they put holes in the walls in my new place not to mention they scratched my new landlords front door and kitchen floor. we called to complain and they said that they would only give 60 cents on the dollar. We called numerous times to have them fix the scratches on the furniture and the walls. They came and did a half ass job. they were supposed to come back and never did. here we are 3 months later and nothing has been resolved. I guess they will move there butts when they receive a letter from my attorney. Worst movers ever!

While some aspects of working with them were good, when I had an issue of realizing that a valuable piece of china was missing and called the office, a woman named Kristen seemed super helpful and promised me John would return my call promptly. He didn’t. When I reached out the following day apparently my message had not even been passed along. After spending $ 5,000 I really expected better follow-​through. John told me he’d check with the warehouse to see if a box of mine might still be there but I’m not holding my breath frankly…

This review is 8 months in the making. I don’t even know where to start. I had to wait this long to write my review because it has taken this long for my $ 2,000 claim to go through arbitration. From beginning to end our move last summer with Colonial from Manhattan to San Diego was a total nightmare. We have moved 9 times in 10 years and I have never ever written a negative review for a moving company. From the moment the crew showed up at our door I have spent countless hours on this awful experience. The team Colonial sent to pack up our apartment and then load the truck was unprofessional and in a nutshell THIEVES. And to think I tipped each of these guys! On day one of two, the driver tried to convince us that we, the consumer, were responsible for any nyc parking tickets they accrued while illegally parked outside our building. A quick call to Mayflower rectified this and they assured us we were not responsible. Glad to hear it since we were spending over $ 8,000 on the move. On day two, the driver proceeded to rear end someone while parking the truck and took over an hour to rectify the situation with police while his crew worked unsupervised in our apartment. Upon arriving in San Diego we found our belongings horribly packed — Colonial admitted to this. I took pictures and sent them to management. Valuable artwork crammed into a box with a flat screen tv with absolutely no packing material! I could go on and on.
I then spent two days straight unpacking every single box because I could not find my DSLR camera, three lenses and two inexpensive watches. These are the missing items that I immediately alerted John at Colonial to and then filed a claim with Mayflower. The last 8 months have been spent filling out and mailing VAST amounts of paperwork and then entering arbitration (which is a total joke). WE PAID THE EXTRA $$$ FOR FULL VALUE PROTECTION OF OUR MOVE. We will never see a penny of that insurance money. SCAMMERS! I have all the receipts of missing items. I have invited them to scour our home for missing items. Again, we paid Mayflower over $ 8,000 and another $ 5,000 to ship two shipments to San Diego and we are going to lie about items totaling $ 2,000!!! Give me a break. John, your last words to me back in August were, «What are you so worried about… you purchased full insurance for your move?» I TOLD YOU SO.
We are about to move again and thankfully I have found honest and reliable people in Southern California to move us north.