A COMPLETE NIGHTMARE THAT WE COULDN'T AFFORD! - Moving Review

FYI- This business has addresses in both VA & LA; only the LA address on BBB shows the complaints. Our family relocated from Tampa, FL to Woodland Hills, CA. As you would imagine, this was a major move. In hopes of finding the best movers to help us, I contacted several movers and brokers. David Knudsen was a hard seller who insisted that he could secure a full-service mover for little more than we'd pay for a company to move our belongings using a self-load and unload contract. David assured me that Budget was one of the nation's leading brokers so we'd be safe in their hands and "they'd be with us throughout the move!"
I gave him a careful explanation of the size of our current home and its contents and he gave me an estimated cost of $4608.00. From his promises, I had every reason to believe that they carefully vet the movers to whom they broker these jobs. Since his paperwork only included the VA address, I couldn't find any complaints. HUGE MISTAKE!
Once our stuff was on the truck, we were informed that our true cost would be $7448.24 (over 61% higher than the estimate we'd budgeted!!) We paid the balance early since we were using a credit card- probably an even bigger mistake. The movers, Duntera of Fort Lauderdale, FL (our next complaint to file) gave us an estimated delivery of between 6/15-6/21. The owner even told us that the paperwork gives them longer, but they have to write that in, not to worry!
The excuses began on about 6/17. The movers often would ignore our calls, so we put in several calls to Dave at Budget only to have him ignored our calls for days, until we finally got a call from Jameeka at Budget who claimed that, after the sale, we were no longer assigned to anyone. She told us that she was sorry we were having this trouble and to call her the next day if the movers didn't arrive. They didn't arrive until 31 days after they left our home in Tampa, yet Budget continued to ignore our calls and we haven't heard from them since. The moving company was negligent packing and moving or things, left our stuff in a trailer in the desert for weeks and delivered our items damaged: broken, chipped, varnish MELTED, etc. and there were also several items we never received! This is no surprise since we saw upon unloading how our items were mixed with items from other customers! Budget has refused to call back or respond to our requests for help with claims. This outfit is made up of CROOKS! STAY AWAY! I'd guess that most victims are so busy fighting the movers and attending to the many responsibilities inherent in a long-term move that they forget all about who started their troubles: Budget Van Lines (of LA & VA- one and the same!)

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