Avoid using Broadway Express at all costs. Literally. Pay more for others, unless you want your belongings to arrive late, damaged, & spend months trying to get them repaired/replaced.
My spouse and I used B'way for a move from Los Angeles to Pittsburgh last June at the recommendation of a friend who had used them twice. Two good experiences for a moving company? That seemed sufficient, & the price was reasonable.
I was not pleased with many of my initial experiences with Todd, who was in charge of scheduling our move, but I shrugged off these concerns. Just days before we were scheduled to move, he tried to change the date of our pickup due to other problems with a load carried by a driver across the country. Who has flexibility when planning a cross-country move? Of course we'd already given notice in our apartment and lined up movers to help us get things into the truck.
The highlight of our experiences with B'way was with a different Todd, the driver assigned to pick up our load. He arrived on time on the appointed day to get our belongings and was very friendly. He offered helpful advice as we loaded my car onto the truck behind our other belongings. He helped us put some extra padding around the car to make sure it would arrive in good condition. We said farewell and drove across the country.
When we arrived in Pittsburgh, I called Broadway for an update. I was rudely told by Todd (at hq) that they would provide an update when there was one; our belongings were still in SoCal.
Three days before the last day in the window for our belongings to be delivered on time, I got a call from B'way. Rather than an update about their delivery, I was told that they needed to move our belongings from one truck to another, but they couldn't do that because they didn't have the key to my car (not required in their instructions about moving a car). When I asked why they needed to move them, they said it was because the driver wanted to use his own trailer...but then added it was also because they thought they saw a crack of light coming through the trailer our goods were in, and therefore they didn't want to risk damage to our items, so they would need to move them. Also, they said it had to do with how they managed when other goods were loaded in front or behind our load (not sure why that's our problem). They asked me to FedEx my car key overnight so that they could move things, or threatened that it might take an additional TWO WEEKS for them to get our goods back!! Essentially held hostage by them, I did as asked. They told me I'd be reimbursed in cash for the FedEx shipping by the driver when he made our delivery.
The truck with our goods finally arrived four days late, driven by a surly and chauvinistic driver named Robert, who said he knew nothing about a reimbursement for a FedEx shipment (I say chauvinistic because he was far more respectful with my husband, while he was dismissive and condescending in conversations with me). When we opened the truck, we noted immediately that the repacking of our belongings had been done haphazardly. One heavy, wooden item was so poorly secured that it almost fell on the head of one of our movers! The B'way Express moving team had decided that one of our bookcases needed to be disassembled. Instead of carefully disassembling the bookcase, which would have involved unscrewing wood planks, the bookcase was ripped apart in such a way that it can never be reassembled and thrown on top of our other items. Several other items were disfigured or crushed. And then we got to my car.
Next to my car, the movers had chosen to put our bicycles... For 2500 miles, our bikes rode next to the car, poorly secured, resulting in significant damage to the car door. When I next spoke with someone from B'way headquarters and described the incident, James, another employee, said, "Who would do that?" referring to how the bikes were packed. Yes, who indeed?
Since then, we have been attempting to get our household and car back in order. Sadly, it's been more than four months now since our goods were loaded onto their trailer, and we are still arguing with their insurance agent over how we will be made whole. They haven't even reimbursed us for the cost of FedEx-ing the key to them! So save yourself the trouble, and go with someone else, especially if shipping a car and/or if you want to be treated with respect. read more