I am updating my review based on the great customer service experience I had with Donna the Resolutions Manager. read more

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I negotiated with Colonial sVan Lines months before my move. They gave me one price. When the movers arrived late, they gave me a different price (Over $1000 more). The move was late, which could have have cost me additional storage fees. The arrival was late. They arrived at dusk dark and required payment in full before they would move anything. They moved furniture first. By the time they started moving boxes it was after 9 pm. I started opening boxes that night and noticed that boxes were missing. I called the drivers, which I had spoken to throughout the day. They refused to answer. I notified the company that boxes were missing. After three months , they called and said they would not reimburse for losses which included, pots and pans, linen, towels, paper goods, etc. Colonial Van Lines contracts with other companies to orchestrate the moves. This company is trustworthy or reliable. read more

Colonial Van Lines promised a lot but delivered nothing. They lied about the pickup date as well as the delivery date and blamed the weather, other customers, drivers, payment and street street size. They refused to call back and failed to provide updates. Their empty promises and refusal to keep me updated cost me 5 extra days in a hotel as well as an extra day on my lease. Worse is I planned this move around daily treatment and follow up care for cancer and they really don't care their how their delays impact my care. Real horrible company. read more

Worst moving experience of my life, and I have had MANY! Broken big screen TV! Art boxes were promised--and paid for--for my collection. The silver and gold leaf frames had tape stuck to them. The tape was holding the old bits and pieces of scrap dog food boxes, etc! When the tape came off, so did the gold and silver leaf! Rude, crude unreliable "moving team"! Every--and I mean EVERY piece of furniture was chipped, scratched, dinged, dented, and smudged with black smears! No pads used! Antique family heirlooms tossed in boxes with NO WRAPPING WHATSOEVER! I reached out to Donna who was recommended as the representative who would get me results. NO RESOLUTION! I had to call the police as the "lead" mover refused to unload my possessions! The local firemen and the policemen moved things into the house! It was a nightmare. read more

As if moving my family across the country wasn't stressful enough... This company has been a nightmare. My car was delivered a week late. Every time I spoke with someone it was, "It'll be fixed today." Well it wasn't fixed until I talked to the car delivery company they used myself. Why I needed them as a middle man is beyond me. Now I'm waiting for my home goods to arrive. With over two weeks notice on being the delivery, day one of my delivery window has passed. Surprise! Again, I some with my rep and just like before, it'll be taken care of... And just like before, no response. They said, "you'll get an email today!" No, no I won't. Do yourself a favor and look elsewhere. This company is a train wreck. The people are nice, but they are not good at delivering on their promise. read more

Resolution department was good in assisting with problems I encountered with Colonial. They are hopefully going to refund me for a box they lost. read more

Buckle up for this review because it's a mess of a move for us. I want to preface this by stating that we have had 4 full service moves since 2014, a combination of military and corporate moves. Two of those moves were across country and we used storage on those occasions. Needless to say we are experienced movers, you can find several moving stickers on pieces of furniture from our frequent relocations. We chose Colonial Van Lines because of their reputation for cross country moves, they contracted with Alliance. The one star I gave for this review was based off of our original movers/ packers. They were prompt, polite, they seemed to do a good job packing our items and attentively wrapped our furniture. Our house was packed, loaded and headed to storage the end of June. We sold our home (on the west coast) and would not be able to have occupancy of our new home (in the Midwest) until August 20th. Our first delivery was August 22-26th, we had little communication and were confused about where our things were. We were finally told on the 26th that the "truck broke down" and we were rescheduled for a delivery September 5-9th. It is now September 10th, we do not have our things. Our new window is September 19-23rd which is almost an entire month after our original delivery date. Our account manager called today with no new updates. We asked if we could just get our things out of storage and drive it ourselves, she informed us that it would have to go through "upper management." This has been an incredibly stressful time for our family, we have two young elementary school aged children and two small dogs. We did not plan to be in transition for this long with out all of our household goods. Colonial continues to say that we will be "compensated" for our delay, but that does not solve our current very stressful situation. I wish they had been transparent and upfront with the driver issues and shortages that they obviously have had so that we could have made a different decision. As it stands my husband will be in the state our things are located the week of September 19-23rd when we are scheduled to received our household items. If the driver has not left storage by then he will load our things onto a truck, with help from family the 24th. Not only will we have to re coordinate this move and my husband will have to take time off of work, but we will have to pay for other transportation costs that we were not anticipating. At this point we just want our things and to be able to live our lives in our new home. I will update this review with the outcome, but I can not stress enough how difficult this has been for our family. read more

Absolutely horrible experience with this company. Not only was their service miserable but the movers they hired for us stole valuables from us. Stay far far away from them. The customer service resolution department (our direct contact was with Donna) did a very good job working with our complaints and we have resolved our issues with them. read more

Horrible company to work with. They ruined furniture, over charged us for the weight we had moved, and are now on the brink of going beyond a 120 day deadline to process our claim on all the damages. I would NEVER recommend this company to anyone!!!! read more

Thanks to Donna at Colonial Van Lines helping work through some issues with the move, I i'm giving a five star rating. The individuals that came to do the work were outstanding and hard-working! Salt of the Earth/good people. read more

Even though we scheduled our move two months in advance, we couldn't get an actual date for pick up of our household goods, but rather a time window of three days. Of course, the movers came the last day of the window, and had to come back the next day, not at the scheduled time, but an hour late. Every piece of furniture, whether an antique or brand new, was marked on their sheets, of which I never received a copy, as broken/scratched. We were given a 5 day window for delivery, and the movers arrived 4 days past the window. Most of our furniture will now need to be refinished, repaired, if possible, or just thrown out. Many of our boxes and crates were crushed and destroyed. Broken dishes, missing tools and equipment, and some items came so mangled and broken, they will need to be to discarded. In all the cross country moves I've made, this is the first time so many items were broken beyond repair. read more

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For our long distance move from San Diego to Texas we got bids from 5 companies. Colonial was the low bidder. Slick website, slick pitch, very friendly sales person, lowest bidder, undercutting Atlas, United, Mayflower. But when it came time to deliver they were missing in action! They demanded a 2 day window for pickup and were supposed to notify us 48 hours out, when the actual time and date would be. Sales person would not answer my calls or emails and handed me off to someone else. They didn't meet the dates agreed on, and the escrow company and the buyer were upset. It cost a substantial sum to delay moving but Colonial did not offer any justification, lamely stating "they couldn't find a truck and driver". 24 hours after the 48 hour window agreed upon, a freelance truck and driver showed up, and they did a good job, but it frightened us considerably, caused sleepless nights, and put the closing of our escrow in jeopardy. I would have fired them if I could have, but it was way too late, and they already had a $2500 deposit. When is a good deal not a good deal? This is a prime example. In my opinion, Go with the Big Boys, don't risk it! I saw on the internet, (after the fact) , that there seem to be class action lawsuits pending... read more

DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY, they are the WORST moving company that I have ever experienced! Hands down! The full reason they are top ranked is because if you have an issue and they give you a small credit back they make you sign a non-disparaging agreement which means you cannot tell anyone how bad the experience was or they can sue you. The $200 credit they offered me was a slap in the face. My son was moving a studio apartment from Massachusetts to DC/Virginia. I was talked into this company by their sales rep, Zachary Velez. I was going to go with First National Van that was $300 cheaper but Colonial convinced me paying $2700 would get my sons furniture their safer and faster. Boy was that wrong. It was an 8 hour drive from one apartment to the other. My sales rep told me they would likely do it in two days at the longest it would arrive on Saturday. Wrong again, it took 8 days! To start the day of the move the driver called my son and told him he would be there in one hour. One hour and forty-five minutes later the driver showed up by HIMSELF! He kept telling my son that another person was on their way but no none ever showed up. He took numerous smoke breaks. It took this guy hours and hours to move everything from the studio apartment to the truck. My son and I called Colonial everyday, multiple times no one ever updated us. When I would call my sales rep he would transfer me to dispatch and they would RUDELY tell me that they had no update or that someone would call back. I cannot even count how many times they told me that someone would call to update and never did. A lot times the rep or dispatch or customer service would say they called me but got no answer. Which is ridiculous, this is 2023 I have an iphone if they truly called they could have left a message. Bottom line, they never called. When you are moving into a city apartment you have to reserve the elevators and unloading area. Colonial also charges if their drivers have to walk more than 75 feet to unload. So we needed to know when they were arriving. Eight days after they picked up my sons stuff they arrived at the new apartment. The truck that contained my sons stuff had been towed. At least that is what East Coast Van lines (that Colonial had hired) told my son. A top manager, Aaron Seusaran from Colonial offered to give me a $200 credit if I would sign a non-disparaging agreement toward Colonial. Aaron also refused to give me his last name, He told me it was company policy but my rep Zachary Velez told me that was not true. Aaron also told me that it was planned to only have one mover pick up my sons stuff which was also not true because Zachary, my sales rep told me there should have been two movers. I WOULD HIGHLY RECOMMEND GOING WITH ANY OTHER MOVING COMPANY OTHER THAN COLONIAL. THEY ARE A DISASTER OF A COMPANY! read more

NEVER, NEVER, NEVER USE COLONIAL VAN LINES! Or any other moving company that contracts someone else to move your items. After booking my cross-country move 5 months in advance, Colonial spewed vile lies to me for two months while I waited in an empty apartment, only to have to contact Colonial's sub-contractor myself to get my items delivered. I am certain I did more of the work than anyone at Colonial, when they "couldn't get in touch with the sub-contractor," I called the sub-contractor directly and got an immediate response on any day of the week. I ended up speaking more with the sub-contractor than Colonial because of Colonial's incompetence. After two months of lying directly to my face, Colonial left me high and dry, not responding to emails or calls, when Colonial's sub-contractor added a whole host of fees at the drop off that were counter to my contract. I was fooled by the positive reviews and the friendly sales people, but don't be like me: living with nothing for two months while being tossed from incompetent Colonial idiot to incompetent Colonial idiot. This company should absolutely not be trusted, I wouldn't even trust this collection of lying fools to move a broken glass of rotten milk one inch. read more

As part of a settlement with Donna at Colonial, I agreed to write a balanced three-star review. Readers who don't feel like plodding through my whole review should know that while the folks at Colonial are unfailingly pleasant and reasonable, they often subcontract out to other movers, who may or may not be pleasant and reasonable. Ours at Cal Van Lines were not. And when push came to shove, Cal Van Lines called the shots. Move-in day was horrific, mostly because of poor communication from Cal Van Lines. Although I had been told that the driver would accept a credit card upon delivery, at the last minute Cal Van Lines insisted on the terms of the contract: cash or money order. They insisted on that before they would even begin unloading. Given more notice, I would have been able to get either. Having just come to town, I had no local bank. I wasted time around town; eventually I had to rely on an old friend to bring me a stack of Benjamins, which I counted out to the driver on the street like a drug dealer (in full view of my new neighbors). The result of this is that they did not begin unloading until 1 pm. And they had to leave at 5 pm because the curbside parking permit ended then. Much of the damage detailed below is a direct result of that rush. The stress of this was enormous, especially for someone who had heart surgery last year. My advice: If they promise you can pay in any way other than cash or money order, get it in writing. And have cash or money order on hand just in case. Reading reviews of this and other moving companies, one encounters more woe than I experienced. Nothing was lost in my move. More than half of my stuff arrived undamaged. I didn't have a heart attack. And I have been promised a settlement: $318 from Cal Van Lines for damages plus $300 from Colonial. Lower ratings should be reserved for more serious loss. Further details: From the start, at every opportunity, I made clear the necessity of having advance notice of the move-in date. Our condominium building only allows one move per day (in or out). It requires notice so that they can put pads on the elevator. And the city requires a $120 permit for reserving space on the curb for a moving van. After several weeks of waiting, I finally reached someone who gave me a date. I arranged for elevator pads and the curb permit and sat in the empty condo, only to be told they would come a day later. I had to reapply for the parking permit and the city had to change the signs. Another last-minute stressor: I was told there would be an extra charge for transferring the furniture to a shuttle (which turned out to be a U-Haul truck). I overheard one of the movers saying they had also transferred the load to a third truck in Bakersfield. All this moving from truck to truck no doubt led to some of the damage. I was absolutely honest with Colonial's Thomas Smith about the items we were moving. I left nothing out. In fact, a refrigerator that was part of the original estimate was not moved (we decided to leave it in California). And yet, the cost based on weight went up. I have never worked at a circus. I can't tell the weight of things by looking at them. I leave that to professionals. When the estimate was made, Colonial should have determined whether or not a shuttle van would be necessary and should have included that in the promised price. Colonial and Cal are moving companies; they should understand that getting a money order in a town where one has not yet had time to open a bank account is difficult. If you're going to insist on that method of payment, you need to give the customer considerable notice. Fortunately, we had a friend in town who heard of our dilemma and brought us cash; the driver accepted that. But half the day was gone. They started unloading at 1 pm. That wasted time led to a rushed delivery. The chrome trim on the elevator was knocked off. Our front door was dented. Debris was left in the common areas. Items - like our bikes, our bed, our bookcases - that had been taken apart by the movers at some point were not put back together. Heavy items were banged around. Beyond the aggravation is the consideration of time. Is the customer's time worth anything? There is the wasted day sitting and waiting in the empty condo, and all the time fixing broken stuff. A few pieces of china were broken and arrived in a box that had a hole punched in the side; there was no compensation for this because it was "packed by owner." A treasured chest of drawers that has been in the family for 150 years was split on the side. There were marks on the wood floor. A small table was gouged. A bookcase was wrecked (no compensation here because it was fiberboard - read the small print in your contract). There were various chips and dents. In their haste to leave when the clock struck five, the movers left debris in various common areas of the condo building. Not a great experience. But it could have been worse. read more

I moved from IL to NC in January, 2024. I was initially skeptical about using this company because the reviews were quite concerning. The gentleman named Drexel was reassuring, consistently following up and I eventually signed up. Apart from a few issues with miscommunication and sometimes calls/emails not being returned, I had a very good experience overall. The driver, Jean and the guys who loaded at origin and the one who unloaded at destination were very professional, helpful and did a great job! I have now finally unpacked my boxes and there was hardly any damage to my stuff. Their prices are comparable with other companies. The default insurance coverage is really low at .60cents per pound, but there was the option to buy full coverage which I did not. Thankfully, I had no damage to report. My overall experience was a good one and I am pleased with the services. I'd like to give a shout out to Drexel, Bridghet, and Jean who are the Colonial Van lines staff that I worked with during my move. read more

This company is outright disgraceful. Please be aware they BLACKMAIL you to change your 1 star reviews to 5 stars (see for yourself time and time again below, it's shocking). If you try to get compensation back you will be manipulated and stringed along for WEEKS under the mistruth that Donna from the Resolutions Department will "fight" for you and is on your side (please don't believe this, it's all a tactic and incredibly misleading). Only to find out just when you think you're coming to a resolution, they will ONLY sign off on the refund, and send you your money back IF you agree to change your 1 star review to 5. It's disgusting. I deserve compensation, but I also care deeply about no one else having to go through the same thing my husband and I have. After HOURS and HOURS of calls reliving the stress Colonial caused us, detailed emails about work missed, money spent, and anxiety endured, picture of damages, scanned receipts from the WEEK we spent living in a hotel (during a pandemic!) waiting for our things with no end in sight, and a clear depiction of every single outrageously disappointing and unacceptable thing Colonial did to us, I got NOWHERE because I would not agree to change my review. Even though I was DEVASTATED, it's not worth it to me to get money back if I have to take down my review. My 1 star review remaining visible could help someone choose a different company and that's SO important. I've never felt so strongly that a company is so horrible, from their team members, their communication, their lack of compassion, lack of care and consideration, and lies -- it is SHOCKING they are still in business. Below is the review I wrote on google that I will not change and now I'm leaving it here too. I wrote it on the LAST night of our moving window, with no communication from Colonial, no returned calls, and no idea where our stuff was, forced to keep spending money on a hotel, during COVID, stressed and broken down. When our things arrived, furniture was damaged, and our truck driver and his team were rude, dismissive and intimating. When they arrived, we asked to see our things in the truck before handing them our money. We were laughed at and turned down. When I asked to at least see paper work, the driver shoved it in my face. The driver demanded to come up to our apartment TWICE before he even opened the truck which made us uncomfortable. He wouldn't allow us to stand down by the truck when he was unloading. My bookshelf was damaged beyond repair, and parts from our bed were missing (that they packed) and they were not going to put it back together even though that was within the contract. I felt extremely uncomfortable the whole time they were moving our things in. When it was all over I broke down in tears. This was by far the worst experience of my husband and I's life. From what I wrote above you can see it got even worse, and in the end we spent 5 more weeks trying to get money back, all for nothing because I won't change my review. It's completely mind-boggling to me how a company that handles people's most precious possessions is so harsh, unhelpful and essentially manipulative. I think the type of operation they're running is disgusting. Initial review I wrote on google 6/21: This has been the worst moving experience of my life. We have no idea where our stuff is at this point. Our account manager went MIA. Customer service is defensive and rude and has not offered to help us in any way. Communication 100% dropped off after deposit was made and pick-up happened. Now we are beyond our move in window and forced to pay for a hotel with no end in sight. We were told our things would be here Friday the 19th so we drove over TWENTY hours from CA to TX to be here by Friday. All of a sudden now we're told it will be here Thursday the 25th which is DAYS beyond our move-in window without any assurance or reasoning why there is such a delay. No one can tell us where the truck even is. Moving during a pandemic is stressful enough. We are putting our health in danger now with being around crowds and staying at a hotel when we would otherwise be safely in our new apartment. We are stressed every single day over this and cannot get through to ANYONE. We have NEVER been able to get through to our account manager at Colonial since our pick up. NEVER. We call and call and call. When we do get through to someone else at the company we're told people who can help us are on their lunch break or out sick, and then they never get back to us and we have to call again. They never call US. We feel sick to our stomachs and have no idea where our stuff is. I cannot believed what has transpired. Times are tough enough, you hope when you pay a company and are assured communication will be solid, that you can trust to at least understand where your possessions are. Where are my things!? We are so worried!! Do NOT work with this company!! read more

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I booked a move with this company 3 weeks prior to my move date. They told me my pick up window (3 days) and everyday before and during the window they called to "update" me that no time had been narrowed down yet. Then, a day before my window closed and 2 days before my lease ended, they called me to inform me that they had no van to pick me up. Mind you, this is after I had already made a deposit and cut off my interactions with other companies. Now I have to find movers on super short notice. I was never made aware that there may not actually be a van. This company is awful and treats it's customers badly. Would not recommend. read more

I would not recommend this company to anyone, as a matter of fact I would tell everyone to stay far away. Let's begin at calling to schedule the move. The salesman, Carlston, said that he would be with us from the very beginning to when our items showed up and would even follow up after. I think he meant he would be with us until he has our deposit. On the day of pickup, they arrived 4 hours after they were scheduled too, leaving us to drive late into the night to make it to our first stop of the cross country road trip. At the day of pickup, we now have a new representative reaching out to us, Bridghet. Where did Carlston go? Now let's fast forward 5 days to the first day of the drop off window(12/19/2023). We didn't hear anything from the company as to where our items were. Since it was cross country, I wasn't expecting our items that fast anyways. On 12/23/2023 we received a call that our items would be delivered on 12/27 or 12/28. On 12/27 WE had to reach out to the company to find out where our items were. We were assured by Bridghet that our items would 100% be delivered on 12/28. On 12/28 we called again and found out that our items were still on the road and wouldn't be delivered until 12/31. Why weren't we informed sooner? Management states it's because they just found out on the morning of 12/28, but management could not answer why there was a lack of communication in finding out the delivery date before the date of delivery. Overall terrible company and on the day of delivery, we find out they're a BROKER. Even the deliver driver said he would never do business with Colonial Van Lines again. Save your stress and find another company that actually communicates with you. After this review was posted on Google and BBB, I have been contacted by the resolution manager, Donna, who has offered compensation outside of the damaged goods. But she asked if I would update the rating to a 5 based on her service. So the company is paying people off to have a high rating. Don't fall for the scam that this company is doing. read more

Complete and utter disaster - avoid at all cost! Where to begin... The first thing to note is that this company is a brokerage firm, where they contract through different local moving companies on each end of the move. The communication between Colonial and the movers who picked up our things in MN, as well as the movers who dropped our things in Vegas was clearly disconnected leading to a lot of frustration on both ends. It took 3 full weeks from the day they arrived in MN to when they dropped our things in Las Vegas. FYI, if they are past their moving window they only reimburse $30/day, meaning them being 7 days late only amounted to $210. We had a lot of uncertainty at every step of the way. When Colonial finally called to confirm a pickup time in MN they advised it would be the next day between 10AM-2PM. About 40 minutes later the local movers called to say they'd be at our house in 30 minutes. We simply were not ready and had to talk to both parties numerous times to confirm they'd arrive the next day at 7AM. However that slight inconvenience was nothing compared to the drop off. I called almost every day asking for an ETA in the last week of the move since they were so late. When we finally received an ETA that Friday, advising they would be there Saturday morning. We waited around all day/night Saturday and no one ever came. I called Colonial about 6 times and they kept saying they were trying to contact the movers but they should still be there. Complete waste of a Saturday. They finally ended up coming on Tuesday (3 hours past the window given on Monday). The movers were the worst I have seen where we had to really watch them to try to get them to bring boxes/furniture into the correct rooms and they kept trying to dump them all downstairs in the living room so they could leave. Finally, as an FYI they estimate based on your items approximate weight. Meaning even if your inventory list is 100% accurate you still may be charged more if their system weight per item doesn't align to your things. We ended up adding 4 medium boxes, a step stool, and two dining room chairs and were charged $1.5K more. When I called to complain they said, "oh that was just an estimate." At the end of the day, only medium damage to our things (I didn't even bother submitting for reimbursement because I never want to talk to this company again). Don't book with them unless you're happy signing up for a lot of uncertainty and headache. read more

In short: We didn't think we were ever going to see our car again. Don't trust this company! They forgot about the job, we had to call them multiple times daily for a week to get traction, they never followed up when they said they would, they didn't reply to any emails, were over a week late on the pickup/delivery, and conveniently forgot about reimbursing us. In full: We used Colonial Vans to transport our car and move our stuff and booked them more than a month in advance. The day before the first day of the 3-day window when they were supposed to pick up the car, they called about the move of our house stuff. We asked about the status of the car which was the first time our account manager had heard of it. The account manager promised to follow up by the morning of the following day. The afternoon of the following day rolls around and no call. We call them. They don't have an update, say they're going to call dispatch and follow up that day. They didn't follow up. The next day, which is the last day of the 3-day window, we call and demand answers. They once again say they're going to call dispatch but we know by then that they're blowing smoke so assume that our car will not be picked up. We were moving out of state but somehow were able to arrange the car to be stored somewhere where it would be safe for a month. We finally get in touch with management and they were at least able to tell us they've been having issues with car transports and it might take up to a month. The manager tried to get us to cancel the contract so they wouldn't have to deal with us anymore but we declined as prices had gone up elsewhere. At this point our move date has arrived and we don't have time to call them everyday to ask for updates. Over a week goes by and we finally get a call that they have found someone. The price for the transporter was more than our contract price but Colonial Vans promised to reimburse the difference. At this point I knew not to trust them so I started to record our conversations in case we needed to take legal action. Our car gets dropped off almost 2 weeks late and we pay the transporter their price. A few days go by and while we received the customer satisfaction email, we hear nothing about the reimbursement. We call them again and they promise to have a manager follow up about the reimbursement. We are still waiting to hear back on the reimbursement and are considering reporting this company to the Better Business Bureau. read more

Showed up a day late, mis-estimated the space we needed in the truck and had to leave stuff behind. The truck started leaking after a light rain. Week late delivering. Everything was stuffed carelessly in really large, mislabeled boxes. Both leads complained about the company. Items broken. Got a phone call from them that promised to address the issues but never heard back. $30k cross country move that cost me thousands more in headache and lost / damaged items. DO NOT use Colonial!!! read more

This is in the top 5 worst customer service experiences I have had. We moved from Cali to midwest and chose Colonial because of their solid (4ish star) reviews on various websites. We had a fleeting moment where we planned to go with a guy with a truck (insured and with good reviews) who would have gotten here in 3 days but we decided to go with a bigger company given reputation and fact that they said our furniture would likely be in TX within 1 week... boy did we make a mistake!!! I thought at first that maybe we had a bad customer service person (over promise under delivering type) but realized quickly (after speaking with managers too) that all the information we received was squishy or downright incorrect. For example, when choosing Colonial they said they run trucks to TX all the time and we likely would be on inside of 2 week window (closer to 1 week). We heard this 3-4x from different people and they barely hit the 2 week window. Because of their inability to communicate correct information, it cost us a few grand in extra hotels etc whereas we could have stayed in Cali for free... They also stated that 90% of moves come in under the weight estimate and yet somehow missed our weight so significantly (by 1500Lbs or 40%%) it cause a $500 increase in our cost. They also charge $150 extra for long haul steps to our door, an overweight fee of $150 or something that we don't understand. I know I know... this is standard for moving companies. The difference is other moving companies tell you up front. These guys say they don't do that when you are doing the initial estimate then just hit you with it day of... this isn't the 90s anymore guys... get it the beep together. You can't get away with this anymore. Next they told us you will receive your pickup and dropoff date the Tues before your move, then it was Thurs, then it was well, we're coming tomorrow maybe the movers can tell you your dropoff date. No one pro-actively communicated with us... we always had to call them multiple times before getting information. There was one certainty we had in working with Colonial... if they said they were going to call us on such a date and time, they 100% never did. Thanks for the certainty there guys. I have never had SO MANY DAMAGED GOODS FROM A MOVE. I moved from east coast to Cali for work and my hubby and I have both (separately) moved a decent amount and have never had this type of experience. They broke probably half the big pieces they wrapped themselves (smashed our babies antique rocking chair), broke wheels off our dining cart, BROKE our TV, scratched several other pieces and somehow managed to break the taillight off my Vespa. That Vespa is my second born... you messed with the wrong Scooter Colonial Not only would we not recommend Colonial (run away as fast as you can!!!), we have already started telling friends, family, and colleagues to avoid at all costs. I would have gotten over the terrible customer service over the process if our got here in one piece but not even close. Also, they PAY FOR GOOD REVIEWS. If you write a negative review, they will give you $$ to change it. We went back and looked and peoples written reviews were bad, but the overall rating was 4-5 starts because people received $ and changed their # of starts. CLAIMS PROCESS terrible. Also beware they pay per pound so if you have a nice light tv that they brake, you likely will only get maybe $50 for it. Their process and systems are antiquated so we had to submit photos like 3 different times, wait a long time etc. read more

Then, once his movers left unfortunately they had an issue with their vehicle that postponed them, which was not their fault. The best is yet to come, I say this sarcastically as when the movers arrived, Jay and Tim who were by the way, absolutely wonderful, they unpacked our stuff to find out that our brand new, 65 inch flatscreen that cost over $800 was completely broken and shattered, also featured in the photos, they had wrapped our suede and leather couch with packaging tape so when we removed the tape our couch was completely ruined and torn, they used our bathmats as packaging material for our lamps so all of our bathmats were ruined, also broken: my desk, my fiancés record player, antique wooden table, multiple lamps, and more smaller items as well. The only insurance that Colonial offered us was $.65 per pound so an $800 TV and a brand new couch basically got us about $40. Basically another load of BS and scammery. My fiancé called them, furious, and they said that if we had purchased extra insurance we would be paid more, at no point were any of us ever offered extra insurance which was another scam and lie. Again, it is worth mentioning that the best part of this experience was Jay and Tim, who don't usually work with Colonial, they actually have their own moving company called AZ Top 10 Moving. I highly recommend them for anyone looking in the Arizona area or beyond. You could tell they genuinely felt horrible for us and helped the best that they could. The aftermath was also ugly. During a move, you want everything to go seamlessly, especially for the top dollar that you are paying. We even paid extra for "handling with care," that was our TV that was $800 and shattered into pieces that we now had to replace. We wanted to turn a new page with this move and the first week was spent dealing with this aftermath, replacing broken items, and paying extra than what we were quoted. My fiancé has reported them to the Florida attorney general who has opened an investigation, FMCSA, plus working with local law enforcement and working on getting our money back. We've disputed all charges on our credit cards and we will not let this go. We are bound and determined to get justice and to make sure no one else has to go through this. From the bottom of my heart, do not put yourself through this stress, financial hardship, and overall nightmare of a moving experience. There are definitely better moving companies out there that are not scams. We received horrible treatment, lies, half of our stuff was broken, and we didn't even receive restitution. read more

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Be careful with this company. I paid about $2500 more than the initially quoted price. There were some people from the company calling me afterwards saying that they will look into it but there was no follow up at all. Very unprofessional company. Stay away at any cost. read more

I wanted to update my last review since it took six months for someone to respond here, let alone, hear from this company the worst "company of professional moving business" the quotes are because that's a joke, personally since submitting my claims paperwork and photos to the "claims office". Any review above 1 star, is fake don't be fooled, every other review is true, honest real, from real people who has really used and was ripped off by colonial. Save yourself heartache and heartbreak DO NOT contact this company unless your belongings doesn't mean anything to you and you can do without them either not showing up for months or broken when finally delivered, missing items that you WILL BE CHARGED EXTRA FOR and definitely costing three times more than originally quoted and extortion if delivered. where's my resolution? i'm sure he'll freeze over before there is any. I posted pictures of the missing and broken items, As well as garbage filled boxes that their movers packed themselves for me instead of taking what I had already boxed and went over repeatedly as to what items were supposed to be picked up and delivered and again being charged extra for extra weight and never receiving a follow up from the claims department let alone resolution which for me would be a refund they need to refund all of us half of the money in fact how about just the extra money that you charged us on top of, you know the extortion money for delivery of our belongings. this company is a fraudulent fraud fake moving companies who deserve to be raided and busted for being fake fraudulent movers read more

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This is a horrible company. They made such amazing promises to us and broke almost every single one of them. Firstly they lied when they CONFIRMED when the movers would come which threw off our entire schedule forcing us to get a hotel with a newborn and two cats. The movers themselves, outsourced which we were told wouldn't be a thing, were soooooooooo unprofessional. They complained about packing things we had specified, complained how heavy our mattress was, and overall were aggressive. They also smoked in the bed of the truck amongst all my furniture, and caused numerous other damages with their mishandling of our items. I've never had a more stressful move. This company is also refusing to give us the compensation we are asking for. If you don't prefer stress and like your things do not use this company. read more

DO NOT DO BUSINESS WITH COLONIAL VAN LINES! The president of Colonial Van Lines is Aldo DiSorbo (https://www.linkedin.com/in/disorboaldo/), who has been taking advantage of customers for at least 25 years. In 1997, the state of Florida banned him from the moving and storage industry for three years for "using tactics such as low-ball bidding to draw in customers and then raising the prices -- sometimes holding the consumers' goods hostage." He ignored that ban and was sentence to jail in 2000, according to the South Florida Sun Sentinel (https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-2000-06-09-0006090259-story.html). SUMMARY: Colonial's employees are only helpful and efficient until they get your money. Then they will stop returning phone calls, miss pickup and delivery dates and completely ghost you for weeks. When your stuff finally arrives weeks later, your things will be damaged, scratched or smashed; they will demand more money than you owe just to take your items off the truck and they will promise refunds but never deliver. DETAILS: My partner and I arranged a move from Connecticut to Florida in May. Colonial didn't arrive on the pick-up date. Two days later a company we'd never heard of showed up -- BCM Relocation of Clifton, NJ! Colonial had assured us repeatedly that they did not use subcontractors so this was a red flag but we had to get our furniture to Florida so we let them load up our stuff. I wish I'd used a GPS monitor to track the location of our furniture. We arrived at our new house in Florida on June 12. We were told that the moving truck would arrive in Florida on June 13-14. They truck did not show up. Nobody from Colonial or BCM would return our phone calls or emails. We were frantic! We had no idea where our things were or who had them. We had an empty house and a couple of changes of clothes - that's it. We had to buy pillows, dishes, cutlery, pots, pans, etc. We were rudely told by Colonial that they legally had until June 19 to deliver our belongings. Colonial blamed BCM for the delay (although they lied to use about not using subcontractors). BCM said their truck broke down in New Jersey and they didn't have another one. Side note: One of the reasons we hired Colonial was because they're based in Florida and our rep told us "we have trucks running up and down the East Coast all the time." Our belongings finally arrived on July 4 - 20 DAYS LATE! They were delivered by a third company we'd never heard of, Seamless Moving. The driver was elderly and in poor health and could not unload the truck. He required me to pay more than I owed according to the Colonial paperwork in my hand but I honestly wanted to get my things and be done with the situation so I paid what he asked. I had to wait about 2.5 hours for two men to arrive and they did the unloading while the elderly, sick Seamless driver napped in his cab. Unbeknownst to me, they'd been hired the night before and had never worked with Colonial / BCM / Seamless but they worked hard so I tipped them and thanked them. When I finally got to look at all of my belongings, I could see that many of the items were scratched - not surface scratches but deep, irreparable scratches - and a large lamp was shattered. We have called and emailed Donna at Colonial asking for our refund. She agreed via email that either Colonial or BCM owed us $364.52 (though by our accounting it's more like $450 and that doesn't include the expenses we incurred as a result of having to buy dishes, pillows, etc. while Colonial and BCM held our things hostage, or the damages to our items) but Colonial and BCM have ghosted us again. Neither one will respond to us and neither one has refunded our money. read more

My newly pregnant wife and I moved from Austin, TX to Atlanta, GA and made a BIG MISTAKE paying up to $5k using Colonial Van Lines. Here's the story... Our move was scheduled months in advance and our pickup date was originally June 17. On the evening of June 15 we hear that our pickup date is being moved up to June 16 at 8am... We had to scramble to get our boxes fully packed and ready for loading a full day sooner and had barely any notice after months of planning. This also meant we had to spend an extra night sleeping on the floor before our planned departure. We assumed this earlier date would mean our stuff would arrive on the earlier side of our June 17- June 30 drop-off window. We were sadly very very wrong... After arriving in Atlanta at our empty home, my wife and I anxiously waited for updates on the drop-off date. Countless calls and unhelpful hours wasted trying to get ahold of someone, and we still had no update after a week of sleeping on the floor in an empty house. It is now JULY 6 (over 3 WEEKS LATER) and we still have ZERO UPDATES on when our stuff will arrive. We are well outside the already generous, and ridiculous 2 week window they estimated for delivery. When we finally do make contact with a representative the response is always, "unfortunately Dispatch does not have a projected delivery time yet"... After 3 weeks of sleeping on the floor or debating paying $200+ a night in a hotel, countless unhelpful customer managers and representatives, and still no update we are TRULY FED UP... AVOID COLONIAL VAN LINES AT ALL COST. There must be some sort of lawsuit for emotional distress for my pregnant wife... assuming our stuff ever arrives... UPDATE: It is July 7th and still NO DELIVERY NEWS read more

Publicpublished review 6/5/22 This company operates unethically. First, they purposely under estimate the moving cost ... then they send an 'expert' to revise the moving cost with on-site estimate. Then they hook you in with lies .. lie after lie. First they lie about the schedule, when you will be packed and loaded, when you will be delivered. Then they lie about the cost .. which they know to be low. Then you are hooked, signed a contract, and you find out the actual cost. Then the schedules .. more lies .. they know they can't make these schedules, and you will want to rely on them, but the schedules will all be blown. Bottom line: lies about cost, lies about service .. This company is dispicable and runs a scam. You will pay much much more than the contract amount. Every part of the schedule will be missed. Avoid this miserable company. read more

Donna from Colonial Van Lines reached out to me and I am very appreciative. Because of her efforts on my behalf I am amending my previous review. read more

If you're on the hunt for a moving company ready to mishandle a quarter of your belongings, overcharge you without addressing your concerns, and teach you the costs and benefits of suing a moving company, look no further than Colonial Van Lines. Our recent encounter with their costly relocation services left us deeply disheartened and frustrated. Their estimate for our moving cost was 75% higher than originally predicted. We expected to pay around 4k to have all of our belongings packed, moved, and unpacked in a new home, but the end result was 7.5k - not unpacked but simply dropped and scattered around our new home. They decided to stop moving 2/3 of the way through the move. Thankfully, TaskRabbit workers came to our rescue. Their pricing scheme and the way they communicate is very convoluted. You are told that you will have a point person to explain everything and check in with you, however, I ended up have 3 point people, and each did not know what the other was doing. One person told me the price would be 5k after weighing everything, but later they raised it to 7.5k. What's more, our most valuable belongings were damaged or destroyed. Our experience with Colonial Van Lines was dreadful and we hope to help others avoid the same blunder. Knowing there are numerous reputable companies out there, we wish we had researched more diligently, and gone with something like Gentle Giant. To underscore the most pressing issues: our most valuable items were damaged or destroyed. Upon arrival at our new home, we were informed that their usual crew was unavailable, and they'd enlisted unprofessional workers, and then did not reimburse us for the "white-glove" service we had paid for yet did not receive, though they did give us $200 for the TaskRabbit workers which is what we will use next time in order to save a great deal of money and headache. read more

Updating my review to reflect my experience after having worked with Donna to resolve my claim. read more

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If you are looking for a reliable mover, Colonial Van Lines and their affiliates are NOT that moving company. We were given a quote based on mileage, my inventory and their "industry standards" for weight - no physical survey of my home was offered. Colonial's customer service is, for all intents and purposes, non-existent. 99% of communication with Colonial was initiated by me - Colonial RARELY returned calls. As a matter of fact, when I asked about the date for the packers, I was given a date only to have the packers arrive a day early, while I was at another appointment. Our contract with Colonial noted that we needed to be loaded and out of the house on June 30th. Colonial agreed and gave a delivery window between July 5 and July 15th. The packers were finished and ready to load the moving van on Thursday, June 30th but the truck was not in the state so packers needed to load the following day. Colonial's moving van pulled out of my driveway on July 1. After the van had driven off, we realized that they did not load an antique brass bed in the moving trailer. I began asking Colonial how they planned to pick up my bed and add it to the load. I was initially told by Elsie (customer service account manager) that we would discuss after they had delivered all of my load. On July 12th I called Colonial to ask when the delivery would take place. Customer service told me that the paperwork needed by finance was "just received at 5:57 pm". Customer service department planned to "expedite the paperwork" and have a final cost and the paperwork to me along with an update by 7/15. Each time I called, I continued asking about the missed bed and each time, Colonial suggested that I ship it at my expense - even though it was inventoried as being moved. On July 20th, I was promised daily updates by my account manager, Elsie. No calls were made by Colonial and on 7/25 I began making daily calls to Colonial for updates. On July 25th I was told the truck was in Texas and the new delivery window was between 8/1 and 8/7. On July 26th I was told that the truck was still in California. When Colonial said the truck was still in California, I again asked them to pick up the missed bed and again they refused. On 8/4, during one of my daily calls, I was told that the new delivery window was between 8/10 and 8/16. On my call 8/8, I was given a new delivery window between 8/11 and 8/13. The truck did finally arrive on 8/13!!!! After all of the load was delivered, I noticed some missing pieces right away. I entered the moving truck to find someone else's load on the truck with some of my furniture mixed in with their load. I am missing 7-10 pieces right now and Colonial has told me that they have not found any of my missing furniture - I highly doubt that they looked! I did find someone else's box, notified Colonial of this and as of 8/16, Colonial still has not arranged to pick it up. Colonial did not even wrap the mattress - packed it with my linen sheet and then dragged it in and out of the truck only to have that sheet damaged. I asked to speak to someone from management on 8/3 and not until 8/29 did I receive a call from "Stephanie". Stephanie had not read my file and was unprepared to discuss any of the particulars in this case. She said she would review and call me back in "24 - 48 hours". By 9/9 she had not called back. I spoke to Stephanie on 8/16 and was told that Colonial had "completed the contract" and they would not be delivering my antique bed, they would only compensate me $30/day for the 28 day delay (no bed or kitchen items for 28 days), and they had not found my missing furniture or parts. She did acknowledge that I would be filing a damage/loss claim and that would be reviewed at that time. I am still unpacking and with each box I unpack I find broken items. Colonial typically packed non-fragile items in paper but did not pack all of the breakables in paper (they wrapped a box of cotton swabs but did not wrap pottery). read more

Movers showed up nearly two weeks later than last day of estimated window. This was after they showed up at 9:30 PM to actually collect the items (2 hours later than when they said they would be there). Then when I did get my items they were damages due to the poor packing and I imagine, overly long time in a truck. Communication was terrible, at one point reaching out to us to see if "we had heard from the movers" (the handed off the work to Ortiz Movers). Then when I received the bill they neglected to take the proper amount off the bill for the actual days missed. I had to call it out and have them correct it. I will never use this company or Ortiz again. I will tell anyone who listens to not use them. I have documentation for all of this. read more

Colonial van lines can up with a solution to fix the problem we had with our move from California to Georgia top notch company to realize that something went wrong and fixed the problem read more

They sell a good product over the phone, but their estimator was about #5000 too light, they sent too small of a truck. They will charge me for the actual weight. (That's sometimes called a "bait and switch"). After they finally picked up the stuff they didn't move it out of their warehouse for.... who knows? it's been in the warehouse for a week and a half with no idea when it's going to start the journey to our new house. They totally blew through the original estimated delivery window with no idea when the stuff will come. UPDATE: Now, 33 days after their subcontractor packed our stuff, it has still not left the warehouse in New Jersey. My family has lived in our empty house in Colorado for an entire month. Colonial's dispatchers have changed their "estimated delivery window" 3 times, and have not given a new one. They say they'll compensate us for the inconvenience, but have not said how, since they ruined a month of our family's summer. Do not use this company. read more

I'm changing my original review specifically because Donna, in the resolution department, did a good job in assisting with the issues we had. By no means was the move without issues and I stand by the trouble we had during our move. This could have went much differently if it were handled immediately, instead letting it linger! read more

I would never recommend Colonial Van Lines to anyone, unless you want your personal belongings damaged! They were extremely careless when moving my furniture and boxes from New Jersey to South Carolina. They broke three pieces of glass and a handle on my china closet, gauged the dining room table, broke a leg on a stereo cabinet, broke a couple of snow-globes, got a brand new box spring filthy by not covering it, as well as a number of other damaged items. Not to mention they lost a box of my Mother's clothes worth @$300 and a couple of sentimental Christmas decorations that can't be replaced! The movers brought in a number of my boxes upside down and crushed. It's like they could care less how they handled moving someone else's things or maybe it was the weed they were smoking while delivering. Every time I turn around, I find something else broken! They also gave me one quote and then when someone else called, gave me a quote of $1300 more when it wasn't even accurate! They keep calling and calling almost like they are desperate for your business...now I know why! Talk about price gauging!! I don't even want to give them 1 star! I will never use this company again nor recommend them to my worst enemy!! read more

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TERRIBLE moving company. Still eating after over two weeks for even an update on when my things will get here. NOTHING. My back is starting to hurt from sleeping on an air mattress and standing to work since I don't have any chairs. I need my work from home desk. I would never suggest using this company. It is not standard to wait this long, plenty of my colleagues have had to move and no one has had this experience. I'm so extremely frustrated. And they have the nerve to call to go over the price which has also gone up multiple times. At this point I have no idea when I'll get my things. Neither do they apparently. Terrible service. 0/10 would never recommend. Heed to the warning. DO NOT USE THIS SERVICE. read more