Prudential Van Lines

I recently moved with this company and had a really positive experience. Jeff D. did a visual estimate for me — he was extremely professional and gave me a fair, accurate estimate. The movers also did a great job and I would use this company again in the future.

Prudential Van Lines moved my 91 year old grandma last week and the Prudential Van Movers were outstanding. Jeff D., the Prudential relocation specialist, was attentive, professional and accomplished everything that he said he and his movers would do. Moving can be stressful but Jeff promised and did indeed take care of all details. Thank you Prudential! I highly recommend them.

Do not use them, on the day of pickup after they loaded the truck.
They advise me the price was $ 3000.00 more. We did have more but
I expected approx $ 1000.00. I do not know how they justified this.
I emailed Casey that I sent him a email 3 weeks prior to things they had
Wrong on contract, also we called them few times with questions to various
size of boxes. Never once advise me of price change. I will be reporting
them to Better Business Bureau.
Sherry B

They should even have 1 star. I was just dreamed at by the sales person because I called to complain that my 9:00 to 10 am move was pushed on the day of the move to 12:30 to 1. I have 9 times in my life and have never had a worse experience in my life. I am scared how they are going to handle my belongs and furniture now. Worst decision I have ever made by hiring this company. Stay away!

Dishonest and basically works like a cartel. Don’t hire them. Trust the reviews here.
The smooth talker sales guy (his name starts from P. So beware of him) mailed me a quote with the less price then they intend to charge me. When the movers arrived on the day, they asked me to sign an agreement which had more price than originally quoted and agreed upon. Knowing my situation, they threatened to walk away if I don’t sign the agreement. They basically ransomed money out of me. Anyways, I called the sales person and asked for the explanation. Surprise surprise. He backed out. He then transferred me to his manager. The manager started yelling at me, cursing me and hung up on me. At that point it was clear that I have to agree to what they say or else they will leave without moving my stuff.
So yeah, be prepared to be screwed over if you hire them.

Basically, don’t use them. Trust this review and the hundreds others below.
They charged me $ 1000 more the day of the move, which you can’t object to. Stuff arrived more than a week after we started our lease. Sales guy was super nice, but everyone else at the company is basically incompetent.
AVOID.

This company is not worth your time or money. Casey and the other sales people are all sweet-​talkers that make it seem like your move will be affordable, smooth and efficient. DO NOT BELIEVE THEM.
I used Prudential to move from Chicago to Baltimore. They gave me a pick up window of sometime between Monday and Wednesday. When they called and asked if they could come Sunday, I wasn’t ready and said not to come on Sunday. Little did I know that when I said «no», it meant that they would contract my move out to a local company in Chicago without telling me. For months, I believed that my belongings were stored in New Jersey, when they were actually in Illinois.
When I had problems with this other moving company that Prudential had contracted with, I called Casey to ask for help in negotiations. It turns out that Casey and the other employees could have cared less about me because my money was no longer going to them. Most of the time, Casey would tell me that he had to «check with his boss» or that «my boss will call you back.» Guess what? His «boss“never called me back.
Also, they never offered to do an in-​home estimate of the moving cost. All reputable moving companies will do an in-​home estimate (see
) and now I know better for next time.

DISHONEST, AND LATE DELIVERY!!!
To start, salesman, Casey convinced me that by allowing him to come to my house for an in home consultation, he «will get the most precise quote by having him write down an inventory of my belongings». I was quoted $ 3299 and I ended up paying $ 4217. I called Casey right away and he seemed surprised with the over charges but he said he would look into the issue and re-​evaluate my inventory once they received it. By then the truck was already loaded therefore I had no choice but to sign the Bill of Lading. (with Casey saying he would re-​evaluate but did not).In addition, I told Casey I need my belongings delivered by 7/​25, as I will be driving to Texas and will start work on July 28. He said he will make a request for priority. He even suggested rushing my move out date to July15 to give the company at least 10 days to ship my belongings. I packed my 1 bedroom Brooklyn apartment in 2 days. I arrived in Dallas on July 25^th and furniture did not arrive. Gary (customer service) & Ben (operations mgr) said I should expect delivery on 7÷26−7÷27. I was furniture less for 6 days b/​c my items did not arrive till ⁷⁄₃₀. I spent extra money on air mattress and everyday expenses like food b/​c I did not have furniture/​pots pans etc. After unpacking, I realized that a few things are missing from my delivery. I am missing a set of knives, a set of mason jar glasses (6), a toaster and a rice cooker. These were not listed in the inventory so it must have been packed in a box which was probably left behind. I did not get a chance to double check the inventory because the driver came to deliver close to 11pm and did not finish unloading till after 3 am. The movers were even asking me if certain boxes or items «looked familiar». He almost forgot to unload my huge dresser until I realized that it was missing! Prudential Van Lines made this the worst moving experience for me. I expected retribution for overcharges, late delivery and poor service and instead I was offered $ 75 «in good faith». I filed a claim with their «outsourced claim department» and have not heard from them since.

I relocated from Philadelphia to Salt Lake City last September. I researched and requested quotes from several different moving companies online. I decided on Prudential based not so much on price as they were not the least expensive, but based on response time from their sales rep Peter and the positive reviews they had at the time. My final conversation with Peter before movers were to come to pack me up was in regards to insurance. He explained that Prudential didn’t offer insurance and he referred me to Bakers International where I purchased a full, replacement value policy for about $ 360. Front end movers were great, they packed, they moved and then stored my stuff for 30 days. 28 days in, I received a call from the delivery mover Ray who explained he would be delivering the following Saturday. This would be a novel if I did not summarize at this point, trust me there is so much to this horror story but to high light. . by the time Ray arrived the storage facility was closed, I had to be inside the facility by 7 to buzz, he ended up being 5 hours late, his truck didn’t fit into facility in fact he couldn’t even get it into the driveway and for this reason he tried to squeeze me for an additional $ 600, I refused, it was getting dark, I was alone with these 2 very large movers & Ray became very angry. He began dropping my boxes off the truck, over stacking them onto dollies, crushing small boxes clearly labeled Fragile w/​big heavy ones, he left boxes broken open w/​my things scattered down the ally to my unit… My pleas for care for my things were met with «shut up lady, you are a liar and you have made me late, get out of my way» plus a bunch of name calling (hard to believe, but very much fact). After 2 hours of sheer hell he had everything stacked IN FRONT of my unit & told me if I didn’t cough up $$ he was leaving me alone to «deal with it» & began cutting MY storage blankets off of my furniture w/​box cutters, insisting they were his. It was dark, he didn’t have flashlights, then again he unloaded the truck in flip flops 2 sizes too small for his feet, helpless & scared I finally broke down in hysterical tears. He didn’t care, I offered him the $ 140 I had on me, he took it, texted me his bank acct # and told me I better have the rest in his acct Mon. am (a copy of text was sent in with my claim as proof). He proceed to push my stuff into unit. I marked on the inventory sheets the damages I could see (arm broken off of leather couch, wood furniture scraped and gouged, broken bookshelves, the big stuff) but Ray went out of his way to make it impossible to assess things that night (no doubt by design). It really didn’t matter anyways because he refused to sign off on any damages, he insisted that I remove them from the inventory sheet before signing, when I refused, he grabbed the sheets out of my hands & stormed away. Prudential was very apologetic after explained what happened, they told me I didn’t owe Ray anything & that was the extent of their accountability at the time. After assessing damages, lost/​missing boxes my losses were over $ 4,000. I filed a claim with Bakers. Since I was not able to note all my damages at the time of delivery & because Prudential was completely unresponsive to Bakers inquiries, they only paid out $ 1,000. For weeks I persistently contacted Peter & his manager Ben, requesting reimbursement. Peter claimed it was out of his hands and his manager pretty much ignored me. I told them I was not going away and if they wanted me to post a review based on no resolve, so be it. Ben immediately responded by referring me to a «3^rd party claims center»
(which was really their in-​house claims department which I was told didn’t exist at the onset of my engagement). They made things very difficult, probably with the hopes that customers will get fed up and walk away without submitting a claim. After meeting their ridiculous demands which included a stack of claim forms, detailed accounting of what took place at delivery w/​photos and a 30 day waiting period, they offered me $ 76.00 stating that it was my responsibility to make damage claims at the point delivery, which, as they were aware was impossible based on the actions of their movers (which was completely intentional for this very reason) I declined and requested they re-​evaluate, they made me resubmit everything (by certified mail both times), wait another 30 days and a couple of weeks ago they offered me an additional $ 50, that was their final offer with a disclaimer that they are not affiliated with Prudential even though they share the same address, telephone number and receptionist as Prudential. There is so much more to this story… you just can’t imagine what they put me through, as if moving across country isn’t stressful enough… If you value your things and your safety… do not use these movers…

Yaniv, Sean and Aziz were a pleasure to work with. Moving our elderly mother across country was very stressful and they were honest, efficient, friendly and accommodating. highly recommend!

CONSIDER YOURSELF WARNED!!! TOTAL SCAMMERS!!!
I used Prudential Van Lines for the first time last month. I originally called in to get an estimate on a move from NYC to Chicago but said that I wasnt positive about where I would be moving to so just needed to have my stuff packed up and put into storage until I knew where I was going. Casey assured me that they would adjust quote based on where I would be moving so it wasnt a problem that I didnt know the city/​state just yet. He said, he would give me a quote for the long distance move but could drop the price considerably should I keep it local instead.
Anyways, Casey insisted that he didnt need to send anybody out to do inventory and quote me a price. He said he could just as easily do over the phone. He and I started to go through my inventory list and about 5 minutes into the call he cut me off and said, yeah yeah yeah, I have done moves like this millions of times. I know exactly what you will need to move a large one bedroom. I was hesitant and insisted we continue to go through each item but he said it wasnt necessary and that he would mark what I needed based on «what he has seen in the past». I decided to give in as I have moved dozens of times over the past 15 years and never had a problem in the past. He sent me a quote for $ 2,100 for my move and an inventory list that was pretty half assed. I called him to have him add more details as it seemed a bit vague but he assured me AGAIN that it wasnt necessary and that my move would be capped at $ 2,100 (if not less, depending on where I was going).
Fast forward to the day of the move. The movers come in and go to work. About 4 hours into packing they inform me that they dont have enough boxes and that the quote they provided me was completely innacurate. In order for them to finish packing my stuff they said they would need atleast another $ 2,000 (TWO THOUSAND EXTRA!!!). The lead guy put me on the phone with his «supervisor» and we argued for 2 hours about this. He said it was my fault that I didnt give a complete list of my belongings and that they couldnt move forward with anything less then $ 1500EXTRA ($ 3,600 total). I informed him of my conversation with Casey and he said there is no way Casey did that. BULL SHIT!!!
Fast forward a couple of weeks. I then decide I am not moving to Chicago but instead keeping it local. They say, great, no problem. I then ask for them to provideme with a break as this is no longer a long distance move and they say that there is NO WAY they can do that and absolutely refused to give me any sort of break on my move. I ended up paying $ 3,600 to move a one bedroom apartment.
As I have said before, I have made dozens of moves WITHIN NYC over the years and I have never paid more then $ 1800 for the EXACT SAME STUFF EVER!!! I ended up paying double what I should have paid.
SCAMMERSSSSSS!!! CONSIDER YOURSELF WARNED!!!

I wish I could give 0 stars, unfortunately that is not an option. I am not even planning on moving yet (3 months away) and when I put in a request for an estimate they called me EIGHT TIMES IN ONE HOUR, only minutes after putting in my phone number. I was at work and these calls were definitely interfering, so upon the 8^th call I answered and politely asked for no more calls considering I had already received 8 and could not deal with getting any more. The EXTREMELY rude and disrespectful man on the phone said to me «Are you stupid?» when I requested this. he said «You put your number in and you’re asking not to get called?» I told him that i received 8 calls in an hour and that I am at work so yes, I do not want any calls. He again said «You are stupid, you are a stupid B****, ma’am.» So I have never even used their services and it has already been the WORST POSSIBLE EXPERIENCE ever. Do NOT try them out.

Wow! Didn’t even get as far as moving with these folks! They called me to solicit MY business! I asked for an honest quote, the woman got very heated telling me there’s a lot of scam companies out there (which I’m not an idiot!), wished be the best and good luck in a sarcastic tone and hung up on me! Wow! Not interested, terrible customer service… I’ve never written a review in my life, ever, but this warrants it… don’t bother calling these guys.

I do not recommend using this company. They charged me almost $ 1000 more than my original quote. Many of my items were damaged and I ended up with another customer’s box! I have emailed and called repeatedly in attempt to return the items but no one will reply. Steer clear!

DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY!!!
Absolute NIGHTMARE! They destroyed most of my furniture and sub-​contracted my job to another company from Miami. When I opened a case with the BBB, neither company would take responsibility and Prudential denied that I ever hired them! The day of my move, a different company arrived, unknown to me. They packed everything up and I had no idea that they were sent by Prudential, and were not Prudential. They never told me they were sub contracting. They never responded to the BBB claim and then they moved to a different location and could not be reached.
If I could take out a billboard warning people about them, I would. When I showed the «team manager» the damage, he offered me $ 20 to and said «fix it yourself».

Holy heck, do I wish I had Unilocaled Prudential before agreeing to have them move us. I will not use this company again.
1. The estimate — Prudential does not come out to visit the house or apartment before giving you a quote; they just talk you through it on the phone. Whether it was because I didn’t provide an accurate accounting of what we had to move (their view) or that I communicated everything I could see but they didn’t translate it correctly into the quote (my view), the move ended up being ~50% — about $ 5,000 — more expensive than the estimate they provide. They did provide a 3% discount in the end to help compensate for the difference, but it was still WAY more expensive than I had been led to believe.
2. Moving day — Enrique, the foreman of their crew couldn’t have been nicer, so credit him for at least trying to make the best of a bad situation. We had explicitly agreed in advance that there would be five guys on the crew. I insisted on this because we needed to head out in the late afternoon and I was worried about getting the move done with fewer people. They sent only four, despite their commitment, and later admitted that they hadn’t sent more because they had over-​scheduled themselves that day. In other words, they knew well in advance they would not be able to meet their commitment, but no one informed me. As a result, the move ended up taking way longer than they expected, resulting in us getting on the road about four hours later that we needed to.
3. The unload — the driver was friendly, but this was the worst unload either my wife or I have ever experienced. We gave the guy explicit instructions about where to put things, but he basically ignored them for the sake of his convenience and getting done sooner. In fact, in most cases, he just left the heavy items on the ground floor and left it to us to carry them up/​down the stairs. He also did not reassemble everything that he moved in, as I had been promised he would do. I still have a pile of furniture legs and loose bolts that I need to sort through.
Before he left, the driver ended up filling the garage so full that the door wouldn’t shut. To his credit, he did come back 2 hours later to move a few things in the garage, but that did not come close to addressing all the other issues described above.
4. Damages — you end up with damaged items in every move, I know, but we had a lot more than I have ever experienced, including in 3 other cross-​country moves. One bed frame, two wooden book cases, and our bedroom dresser were badly scratched or cracked beyond repair, and we have barely made a dent in getting through the other moving items. Prudential does not provide full insurance coverage as part of the base price, so make sure you buy the optional plan.
In summary, Prudential missed our estimate (I can believe that I am partially at fault, but still), ran late on loading because they didn’t live up to a commitment they made, didn’t unload the way we asked, and damaged an unusually high number of items. I expect better.

DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY!!! Holy crap!!! I dont understand why they are still in business THEY ARE AWFUL!!!
They are thieves and liars and will make your move a miserable experience.
First, the estimate was off my $ 1000 despite me deciding to take only boxes and suitcases and not move any furniture.
Fine, I had more boxes than I bought so I let that go.
Next, the people who send you a contract (Peter or Jay) are out of the picture once they give you a date the movers will come.
So, though I requested my stuff leave NYC get stored for 1 – 5 days and then leave the warehouse in order to get to CA by the 16^th-​18^th of August, my stuff didn’t even leave NJ until the 18^th!
When I asked for a new date they gave me a Fri-​Sun window. But didn’t actually show up until the next Wed at 10pm.
And oh yeah. Don’t even bother calling and asking when your stuff will arrive because they YELL AT YOU FOR CALLING!!!
I am giving this place one star because the girl, Erika, who answers the phone is nice and I feel bad for her because her boss Ben (head of dispatch) is a creep and a liar and should go out of business.
I have moved across country 3 other times. This is my 4^th. And this is the WORST moving experience I have ever encountered.
DO NOT HIRE THESE PEOPLE!!! They will make you miserable.

I SHOULD HAVE UnilocalED PRUDENTIAL PRIOR TO PACKING!
When we moved from Yonkers to Fort Lee we thought that hiring a mover would be as simple as doing a search on Craig’s List, getting a quote, checking them out with the Better Business Bureau, and move out! The building we live in has very strict move-​in rules that require all movers to produce a copy of their Certificate of Insurance prior to scheduling the move-​in date. With such firm moving policy, my idea for renting a truck and picking up a few migrant workers went right out the window.
After calling a few of the listings, my wife spoke to Peter Susi, a Moving Consultant for Prudential Van Lines. Peter was such an «oh, he’s such a dear» nice guy when she was calling to get a quote. For 1 Truck and 3 Men he told us that for a place our size should only require 4 hours between loading and unloading the truck. He factored in an additional hour for travel time and quoted us a rate of $ 90.00 per hour. Our estimate was $ 450.00 and they charged us $ 25.00 for the Certificate of Insurance. The total estimate was $ 475.00.
Quick Tip: If a Moving Consultant says that he can quote you an estimate without seeing either your apartment or possessions… then you need to RUN LIKE HELL!
So moving day came and the crew arrived and immediately went to work. They were courteous and careful with out things and even took care to specially wrap our furniture to prevent accidental chips and scratches. By the time things were all loaded in the truck and we were leaving from Tuckahoe, about 6 hours had passed. they estimated that it would take another full hour to unload. By the time we got to Fort Lee (only 13 miles away), they figured that the total time for the move would be 8 hours and they demanded that we would fork over $ 900.00 before they would take anything off of the truck. This was TWICE the quoted estimate.
While unloading the boxes and furniture things moved much faster. The movers were helpful and even repaired the leg from our dining room table. We gave a generous tip because we really thought they did a great job. It wasn’t until after the movers had left that we realized that one of our boxes were missing. My wife and I had received a stand mixer complete with attachments as a wedding gift and it was still in its unopened original packaging. Mysteriously this box was no where to be found in our new home and it was not on the truck as I performed a final inspection of the truck. The one place that I did not check was the front seat, because let’s face it why should any of your things be in there?
When we discovered that our prized stand mixer was missing we called the friendly Peter whose demeanor had now dramatically changed. He acted as if this was not his problem and he referred us to the Claims Department. After waiting several months, the Claims Department denied our claim and said that we could not prove that we even ever had a stand mixer. During the months of waiting we made several calls to both Peter and the Prudential office and they could not have been less helpful. When we asked them if they had any information or could help us escalate this issue, they told us that it was not their problem.
We would never use Prudential Van Lines again and we would never refer their services to our worst enemy. From reading some of the other reviews on this board it seems that Peter Susi is still gainfully employed. I have read other review sites like Citysearch where this company has an overwhelmingly large number of positive reviews. It makes me wonder whether anybody has bothered to check whether these were real people writing real reviews or if these were just shills purchased by Prudential as damage control over their negative reputation. At the time that this review was written there were 14 suspiciously written 5 star reviews all glowing with how great their move had went. Thank god Unilocal has its filter in effect to prevent companies like this to game the system to their benefit. The word is out on Prudential and hopefully others can learn from my mistake.

My moving is done and everything, almost is unpacked!
Your guys did a very good work.
They are professional, sympathical.
They are fast but always taking care of each items we had
it was very comfortable to have them doing my moving
It was a pleasure working with you as well, always available and kind
Prudential can be proud if his staff!

Peter from Customer Service charged my credit card before I had a chance to approve the contract. Once I declined to use them, he said my card was already swiped and I was going to be charged a credit card usage fee, only to be refunded 95%. I asked why since I never signed anything. He called me up, all aggressive and pissy saying I could take it up with my credit card company and hung up on me. I later got an email that his manager authorized a full refund. Duh!
Update — Peter from Customer Service emailed me apologizing for being rude. I guess it’s better than nothing. Although I certainly didn’t need the drama on top of the stresses of moving.