Movers/Moving Companies

We are in the process of hiring a mover now, too.

For those who used JK, it seems that they went over their estimated time for many of you. Do you think it would be possible to get them to agree to their original estimate as a maximum price as well? Any other ways to massage their numbers slightly? I'm new to the moving game...any tips would be appreciated.
Thanks.

 

When we moved we used Able movers. They came in below their estimate both times we used them. We helped the process by having as much stuff ready to go. We had all the boxes that we could lift moved into the garage so they could get them onto the truck fast.

When we got to the new house, we also helped them carry light things off and had everything labled well so they could figure out where to put the stuff without asking a lot of questions.

We also had lots of water and soda for them so they were hydrated and happy.

I can tell you that both of our moves came in at least an hour under the estimate.

 

They only went over for me because I asked them to do additional things the day of the move. I think they are actually very good at estimating the time, but little things like "oh can you move that bicycle too?" tend to add more time than you would think. They did go over by about an hour for us, but then they let us keep the wardrobe boxes that we "rented", and didn't charge us for them. So it ended up being about the same overall cost. We also saved some money by going for a $500 deductable on the insurance instead of the standard $250 deductable. You might check to see if rates are cheaper during the week -- if they are busy most movers will charge more for weekend moves.

 

Good experience - Three Men And A Truck. Did everything they said with no hassles and everything arrived on time and in good shape.

Bad experience - Upack. We thought it might be easier (financially) if we did some of the packing and loading ourselves. They were late picking our stuff up and late delivering it by two days. When we tried to contact them to ask about, we got the runaround and didn't hear anything until they showed up.