S. in York

I was referred to Francis by a cousin who reported a great experience with the company. We used the packing service (3 women @ $105 per hour) the day prior to the big move and were very impressed. They took pride in their work and worked efficiently, treating the household goods as they would their own. Different story for the movers though, unfortunately... Our move was scheduled to start on 9am. At 945 AM my wife and I became concerned and called the company, only to be told that the movers were on route. At 10:00, still no movers, so we called again, and we were told that the movers got lost. Finally, after providing the driver with directions, the movers arrived at 10:15 AM. When confronted about this later, Mr. Francis made excuse after excuse for inexcusible behaviour and unprofessionalism. He told me that our house is in a new subdivision (it's 3 years old on an assumed street) and that the old Perly's map that the driver was using didn't have our address listed. I would have expected a phone call from the company before 9 AM if directions were needed. Moreover, the route to my house should have been well mapped out ahead of time, given our move was booked 1.5 months in advance. The movers started out moving our belongings rather efficiently, especially since all items were professionally packed and I had pre-disassembled the office unit and bedframes. However, 2 hours into the job things slowed down tremendously. Only 1 of the 3 movers was seen doing any work. If you don't mind paying your movers for smoke breaks every half hour, this might be the company for you. On top of this all, the movers ran out of packing tape (to wrap blankets over some of the larger items like couch and console table), and ran out of plastic wrap. In my estimation, the move could have been completed at least 1.5 hrs earlier than it actually took. If you look under the negative reviews in this section at the "company's" response, you'll start to get a pretty good sense that Mr. Francis will never take any accountability and is a man who will perpetually make excuses to avoid responsibility. Mr. Francis will probably write a story about how it takes longer to wrap the furniture carefully and blanket the larger items for protection, but this isn't the point. I appreciated the care the movers took with my belongings, and I'm fairly certain all of my belongings made it into storage in one piece, but wasted time on my dollar is unacceptable. Mr. Francis, notorious for his excuses, told me that I was rather lucky that the movers came at all for my move, as it was hot outside, and curiously, if I had lived in Europe the movers would have refused to work on a day like the one we had (it was average summer Toronto weather at approx 28 degrees celcius, and the AC was running the whole time inside). I expect workers to take breaks when needed....WHEN THEY ARE WORKING. But again, it was only one guy doing, one guy smoking, and the other "packing" the truck most of the time. When I asked for Mr. Francis to take an hour off of my bill, he flat out refused and had no appology for the fact that the movers ran out of tape and simply waited for me to go to the dollar store to pick up some more packing tape before they recommenced any "work". However, once at the storage unit, he finally agreed to comp us the rental of the 10 blankets used to cover our furniture (at $5 a piece/month).