We contracted Impact Zone for moving our house, turns out it is a totally wrong decision. First of all, we booked the service in 2weeks before actual moving, however when we called Kim multiple time in one week, just to confirm whether we are still good for the move due to the weather, he couldn't even find our appointment. Out stuffs include one master bedroom, one living room, plus two baby cribs, and one treadmill, and one elliptical, took them nearly 10 hours to complete the moving. The reason provided by Kim is because they have no idea how to de-assemble the treadmill, and the baby outdoor play set, and also to put them back on when they been shipped to the new house. For the elliptical, they decided not to spent time learning how to take it apart, instead they just simply pushed it up to the truck through the concrete floor and metal trail, that eventually caused the bottom part been broken into pieces. And the power cord been missing, we been using the elliptical all the time even one day before the move. Really funny part is Kim told me that they will have to leave the wardrobe in the garage because our mudroom is not high enough, and he, on purposed, put the corner wardrobe against the other item to make sure it will not fall down, because he knew the bottom part was broken during the moving, and he left w/o saying a word about that. Unfortunately we only found that out on the 2nd day when we tried to moved the wardrobe back into the mudroom, the entire bottom part of the corner wardrobe been put aside and broken, there is no way we can put it back on no matter how hard we tried. The corner wardrobe was perfectly standing together with the rest of the wardrobes, however Kim told me it was broken even before they moved it. Total damages caused by Impact Zone during the moving is $200, given the items we bought in about a year ago, (corner wardrobe $145 with new item, power cord $39.99, and bottom piece of elliptical is $150), Kim only agreed to pay $100.
Almost forgot, they left for lunch at 12:50pm, and came back at 1:30pm, nearly 40min while Kim only count 15min as lunch break.
Lesson learnt:
1. DO NOT believe what Kim's sales pitch about insurance they have can fully cover any possible damages during the moving, that will NEVER happen under any circumstance.
2. DO NOT believe they said how professional and experienced they are about how to take apart the furniture, and any equipment you have in house, and put them back on again, because they don't know how to do it.
3. Check every item they move make sure they are still functioning, at least can be standing w/o leaning against anything in the same day before you write a chq.
Recommend this company to my closest friends and family? Hell NO, GO Elsewhere!
- Approximate cost of services:
- $1,200.00
- Company Response
This has been a very tough situation to deal with over the last number of days. Customer Service is a huge priority of our company. Which has made this decision a no win one.
Even though we were told what we were moving when Simon phoned in, as he stated above, we arrived and there was actually 3 bedrooms full of furniture, bonus room, living room, kitchen with table and chairs, numerous items in basement, garage and inside kids play structures that we had to disassemble throughout the house. We also had an outdoor approx. 6’ x 8-10’ play structure with swings, slide etc., trampoline, full complement of patio furniture, yard tools with most needing to be dug out of snow and ice not to mention torn down to fit into truck and down side of house. Simon was also not packed and he spent the whole day packing items. To get items over that he wanted we did 2 completely well packed truck loads. This included packing his whole closet, taking apart 8’high cabinets as they were built in room and was no way to tip them to get out of room, taking apart more of the cabinets in Garage to be able to tip to remove. The treadmill we frequently take them apart on move jobs and although most are different, they are similar in process, takes about ½ hr. to tear down and same to reassemble. The Elliptical did not have to be taken apart as we could get out of house in 1 piece and we cross strapped (straps we use for heavier awkward items that go over our shoulders) it out of Simon’s walkout basement. As it was a Cold day(-20 with wind chill) plastic becomes brittle and when putting the Elliptical down the cover on the moving handles broke. Damage was pointed out to Simon and we would discuss at the end of the move. As for the power cord, it was not on the unit when we moved it, we did check our truck as courtesy just in case, but it was in Simons belongings where he had to have packed it.
The wardrobes that were going into the Mudroom are the same as what was taken apart in master closet and garage. One of these was an L shaped unit, this is the one that Simon claims we damaged. Because the units are almost 8’ tall and most ceilings are 8’ we had to take the L part off. When we started to take apart we noticed bottom shelf was damaged as if too much weight was put on it. It was not mentioned to Simon because it was like that and not something we did. They were all placed in his garage as they would not stand in Mudroom as shown to Simon when we tried with first unit. The Corner unit that bottom shelf was broken was placed in a safe spot cause there was only 1 shelf holding the two 8’ sides.
So at the end of the move it came time to negotiate the damaged plastic fascia from the elliptical. Simon wanted a $200 discount for this, which was really high in my opinion. We finally settled on $100 discount as it was a long day we were tired and Livestrong 1-877 number was closed. I wrote the livestrong 1-877 number on invoice so Simon would have it handy and could call. On follow up emails when he informed me about the L shaped unit and power cord, he said part was $150. I then called and got part # with cost of $14.60 a drastic difference. He responded that he called a different 1-800 number so I gave him the right one again, part number and cost. As mentioned the shelving unit was crushed when we went to take it apart already and power cord was not present. Even though it is a rarity, the odd time damage does happen and we are willing to take responsibility if we are at fault. I am not willing to pay for damage or missing items that was done by others.
As for lunch break it is only courteous to allow us 15 mins to pick up lunch and eat while driving for a time period such as Simons move. I happened to pick up 4 taco’s that day and felt it was not safe to drive while eating so I ate them in parking lot and deducted 15 mins from bill to compensate. Rest of time Simon is referring to was drive time between locations.
We do carry Insurance with good coverage, it does have $1000 deductible, hence small damages if they happen we cover internally. We have never had any large claims against policy as damage is something we try very hard to make sure does not happen.
Hate to say a majority of movers would not be able to make Simon happy. Upon further investigation, without knowing details about the dealings with the other companies we found out that of the three reviews Simon has written, all were negative which leads me to believe that Simon was the main issue.
I had to make the decision knowing that Simon would give us a negative review but I would not be bullied into paying for things that were not our fault.
Kim Semeniuk
Impact Zone