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The quotation visit was easy and accurate. They gave us a couple of options for shipping. The movers who packed everything turned up on time and did a superb job of packing everything. Their colleagues in the United States then delivered and unpacked everything and took away the rubbish.
All our stuff arrived in perfect condition.
Communication with… multiple NZ VanLines staff throughout the process was easy and quick.
Very happy to recommend these guys, I researched a lot of moving options beforehand and am really pleased I chose them.
The representative promised so much care would be taken with our chattels, estimated our job and volume and negotiated our quote down until it was $1,200 more than the next quote, but we went with it because we were told we would have our things packed in the one truck and not moved until they came out at the other end. We preferred this over the container option as being transported off and on… various trucks, trains, ferries etc seemed more of a risk for damage to us.
It all went wrong on the first day. They didn't do a reconnaissance as we suggested, as to where to park the truck on our hill and ended up getting it stuck in a grass verge, which took 1.5 hours to sort. This was 2.5kms from our house so the ferry vehicle was gone for considerable periods of time each trip. The job ended up taking 10 hours instead of the indicated 4, and when they went to our business address to pick up the remaining chattels, which by now my husband had loaded out on to the street to save time, they announced there was no room in the truck as we discovered they had already loaded another delivery in the front half. So at 6.30pm on a Friday night, he had to stand there guarding it for 2 hours whilst I contacted the rep and insisted they send another truck to take it back to the depot. Eventually this happened and we were told it would be sent the following week.
Two days later, halfway to our new destination, we get a text from the rep requesting a further $1,800 from us over and above the $6,400 we had already paid because the job took longer than anticipated. As we were on the ferry then had a long drive with intermittent cell coverage I didn't reply that day. The next day we received an email from the company requesting the further payment or our chattels could not be delivered. I emailed back that we had a contract and had paid the amount as per contract and would not be paying any extra. We received another email stating they had reassessed the volume, which they claim we understated to them and they had quoted on considerably less than they picked up (we pointed out that their rep had gone through our entire house and we had not purchased any additional items or hidden anything from them) and now wanted a payment of $1,600 to ensure delivery. I tried ringing our rep but she would not answer our calls, I tried calling the area manager but he wouldn't return our calls, so I wrote an email to the CEO, whom the company encloses a letter from thanking us for choosing "the number one removal company in NZ" and giving us his personal assurance that our possessions would be treated with care by their highly trained staff etc. A brief email came back the next day stating he would look into it. The day before our delivery was due, we had not had a phone conversation or confirmation from the company confirming that our chattels would actually be delivered, so in the afternoon we had our lawyer write a letter demanding the delivery as per contract.
At 5.30pm the night before due date we received an email stating we would get our delivery at no further cost. The next day, being delivery day, I had to call the Auckland office and ask when exactly the truck would be turning up so we wouldn't inconenience people on our shared access and was told 2pm. At 3pm I called back and asked it was far away and was told it would be here within the hour. At 5.15pm I called the company again and the office was closed. At 6pm we decided it surely wasn't coming that night and our real estate agent ran around town organising an air bed and bedding for us as the town was booked out for Waitangi weekend. At 6.40pm the truck arrives!
For the next 4 hours we helped the 3 guys unload and carry things down our 2 flights of stairs or they would have been here until Midnight! Broken and damaged furniture was handed over, much to our distress, including a new table with only 3 legs... "The other one will be in the truck somewhere" they said! Half the things in that first load weren't even there.
After the long weekend I wrote once again to the CEO and our lawyer to point this out, request a copy of our inventory which we had never been given but were asked to sign off on at 10.30pm on the Friday night ("subject to inspection" I signed it) asked for a list of the remaining items to be delivered and a date and time for this. No response again. After 3 days and more emails and phone calls on our behalf, we were told it would all come that Friday.
Well it did.... All jammed into a small truck, dinged, damaged, scraped and broken. Then we were told that the truck with our goods in a container plus another one, had been written off in an accident the day before, the driver was in hospital, and sorry, some of our stuff got damaged. After they dropped it all in various rooms, that was the last we heard from them.
As we unpacked over the weekend we discovered box after box of broken items, all the fragile boxes squashed, torn open, knocked about, but the worst thing.... a box of bathroom toiletries etc had been dropped on the bedroom floor and unbeknown to us, a broken bottle had leaked all through our very expensive carpet and wrecked it. So now we face a 4 week wait to have it ripped up and new carpet relaid so we can't unpack or move in downstairs in the meantime and it is a $20-25k job due to NZ Van Lines incompetence!
Do NOT consider this company! From what we hear, under quoting to get the job then demanding more money before delivery is a tactic, the promises are empty, the follow up is zero, right through to the top. No real apology and no attempt whatsoever has been made to rectify this situation and our relocation went from exciting to a nightmare in the space of a week.
Would never deal with them again, they cost us a lot of time and money and accepted no responsibility for their complete incompetence.
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Communication: 50% | Quality: 10% | Reliability: 0% | Value: 20%