What a wild, terrible tale of dodged accountability, crime, and incompetence!
In 2023, I rented a space to store my car trailer with Public Storage. The price was good- it was a Memorial Day special, and was about 40% less than other locations. At the time, I asked the staff at the location if the rate was likely to go up. They said it was not likely to go up for at least a year, since the annual increases had already happened. So I stored my trailer there and put several locks on it. A wheel lock, a hitch lock, and also a location tracker. Three months later, to my surprise, the price went up significantly to just above the price of nearby locations. Due to the hassle, I didn't move. I certainly should have. So much regret....
On January 6th of this year I got a call from the staff at Public Storage. Had I removed my car trailer? No, I replied. I hadn't. Why? It turns out, they had a very bad feeling about my missing trailer.
According to the staff member, just before the holidays, an individual had come in and rented the smallest unit available. They took and verified their ID and took payment.
Early the morning of Jan 1st, video showed the individual entering the complex with their PIN, and then leaving with my trailer.
Sure enough, the location tracker showed a location other than Public Storage. Unfortunately, because they had taken 5 days to notice the crime, the location corresponded to the tracker in a dumpster.
The staff at Public Storage explained that they were not in a position to make a police report, but that while I had to make the police report, they would not give me any of the information they had about the individual that had given them ID and had been seen leaving with the trailer. All I could fill out was a generic police report with as many specifics as I had, and many months later I haven't been contacted by the police. Even my insurance company can not get any information from Public Storage.
Since the trailer had been stolen early January 1st, I asked Public Storage to refund me for the month of January. While they wouldn't help with anything else or reimburse me any further, they did agree to finalize the account with a 0-dollar balance.
Not surprising, I now have "Cedar Business Services", a Las Vegas collections company, hounding my e-mail, phone, and mail for the rent for that January. Like any terrible collections company, they won't believe me that the balance is zero.
Calling Public Storage, I found out that they never did refund the account. I also asked them to remove the collections. Their response? "We can't do anything about that other than show that the account is paid."
What CAN the staff at Public Storage do? What are they ACTUALLY capable of? The only thing they seem to be capable of is raising the prices long before they said they would. Now I have a missing trailer and have to pay a lawyer to fix the collections issue.
Conclusion?: You are going to spend less time and less money storing your things in a vacant field. read more