Royal Van Lines, Inc.

I delayed writing this review as I was first trying to sort out some problems directly with Royal Van Lines regarding the move of my daughter's effects from St Catharines to Calgary in July 2012. Unfortunately, in spite of being very patient, these haven't been resolved yet and I now have file a formal complaint through the BBB. So I am way overdue in writing this review and probably I should have done it a lot sooner. There were several problems with this company, but the main ones were for overcharging weight over 1000 lbs more than it really was and for failing to refund a warehouse handling charge that they had agreed to refund.

In mid-June, through the Moveit.ca website request for quote from movers for the move size of a studio (less than 2000 lbs), I had received several quotes and decided to go with Royal Van Lines. Through e-mails with Emma Oz, the Sales Rep, I had then updated her with a calculated weight of 1600 lbs for the effects to be moved based on having individually weighted each box on a home scale. I was completely shocked when I found out just prior to the delivery that the actual weight I was charged for was 2940 lbs, almost twice as much as I had calculated. This overweight represented a cost of about $500 more than I was quoted. After the move, I discussed this discrepancy with Emma Oz, and later on with Brock, Customer Service Manager, but my request for refund was turned down. I asked to get a copy of the scale tickets for prior and after the pick-up, which Emma and Brock both said they would send to me, but they never did in spite of several reminders. I now believe those scale tickets do not exist and the weight they charged to be completely bogus, which is why I filed a formal complaint.

In the quote I received, the company specifically guaranteed "No Hidden Charge or Surprise Cost". However, this wasn't the case. The final bill included a WAREHOUSE HANDLING charge of $75 that was not part of the moving contract I signed during the pickup and nowhere was it mentioned in the quote Emma had given me. Both Emma, and later, Brock agreed to the refund but the credit transaction has yet to show up in the credit card I gave them. There was another surprise cost, that fortunately I was able to avoid. Just prior to the delivery their Calgary office called to find out if there was any stairs and stated that it would cost an extra $500 if there was. Luckily we could use an entrance door on the ground floor and avoid a huge and exorbitant surprise cost, particularly for such a small move.

Initially, the pick up on 4 Jul was arranged for early morning, which got changed to early afternoon, then mid-afternoon with the movers finally showing up late afternoon. I had to make several phone calls with the dispatch to find out what was going on. There was no harm done with this delay except that I had to change my own departing plans.

The delivery period was very long. I was told the effects would be delivered in 7 to 10 days. So, my daughter and I plan accordingly. However, I wasn't told this is from the time they left their warehouse in Toronto. My daughter's effects were picked up in St Catharines on 4 Jul, but delivered in Calgary only on 28 Jul, over three weeks later, which created a few problems for my daughter. If I had known it would take so long, I would have use another mover. The company didn't offer any compensation for the long delay.

Following the delivery, I tried several times to talk to someone in Customer Service and left voice-mails which weren't returned. I then contacted Emma who became the intermediary to deal with the problems although she acknowledged she wasn't the right person to deal with them. However, she did not refer me to the right person and things just dragged on with nothing happening. Eventually, I managed to reach someone in Customer Service (Brock) in early Sep who agreed to do the credit and to send me the scale tickets. However, a week later when nothing had happened, I left him voice-mails which he hasn't returned.

During delivery, the movers somehow dropped off four extra boxes that did not belong to my daughter, which required arrangements to be made for these boxes to be retrieved by the company and returned to their rightful owners.

On the positive side, all my daughter's effects were delivered in good condition with only minimal breakage not worth putting a claim. The personnel that did the pick-up in St Catharines and those who delivered in Calgary were fine. Nevertheless, the negative aspects for the service provided by this company far outweigh the good side. As such, I will never use Royal Van Lines again and would strongly NOT recommend it to anyone.