When Frank, son of the founders of Joseph's Movers, provided his estimate he impressed me with his aw-shucks ways. Between that and the fact that the company seemed to have been around long enough for the son to follow in the parents' footsteps, I hired the company for our move.
Setting the moving date with Frank, I asked him one favor: "Do not deposit the down payment check I'm giving you until payday," as some unexpected expenses had upended our available funds. He assured me they would wait and even allowed me to postdate the check. Next thing I knew, someone at Joseph's went ahead and deposited the check the next day despite the fact that I had dated it for several days later. Fortunately, the way the other checks I had written worked out, no checks bounced so I didn't complain. (To be fair, the bank should have noticed the date on the check even if the Joseph's office staff didn't.)
Then there was moving day. It was supposed to be a crew of four men but only three, including Frank, showed up. Frank said the fourth guy could not make it. Now, Frank is not a big guy and not that young. In fact, none of Joseph's crew of three was that big or strong, and only one was young. The move took a long time, much longer than it should have.
The per-hour charge was 25% less with three movers instead of four. But you know a crew of four men is gonna be more than a quarter of the time faster than a three man crew.
Of course we were going to tip Frank and his men but it annoyed me that he told us a gratuity was an expectation. I wonder how many people tip less because the movers ask. But despite my disappointment I tipped them what I had planned to anyway, when I thought the move would be over a lot sooner than it was - the crew chief, whose name I forget, gave us good advice on setting up furniture and rugs and all three movers went out of their way to help us a couple of other ways.
No damage to our possessions.
In a qualified way I recommend Joseph's, as I want to believe Frank had planned on having a crew of four only to have to do it with three. Had there been a fourth mover, none of the other disappointing aspects of the move would have mattered as much to me. read more
