Unfortunately, I had a negative experience with Smith Dray Line moving company and I would not use them again, nor would I recommend them to friends or family.
Initially, things seemed to be going very smoothly and I was able to set up a video survey with Sarah Miller without difficulty for a cross country move with only 2-3 weeks of notice. I was given a delivery window of ~3 weeks, which I thought was too broad in order to set up housing on the other end of the move. When asked for a smaller window, I was given two days as most likely, but that the broad 3 week window continued to exist. Thus, I secured housing for the 2 days that were told and asked Smith Dray Line to give me more definitive dates if that changed, especially if it was sooner, so I could change the lease to accommodate the delivery date (I was told this would be done).
On the week of the move, I called to confirm that packers were coming the day before the movers as an email had stated. I was told that no, in fact people would only be coming on one day. On the day of the move, the movers came at the allocated time and were surprised that the packers had not already been there. When I called Smith Dray Line, there was no answer and nobody returned my voicemail to discuss the problem. Finally, I ended up having to talk to the contact person that the movers provided through Atlas and packers were dispatched to my apartment. Fortunately, both the packers and movers were great and did a quick/efficient job.
The delivery end of the move was where the real problem occurred. I was told on a Wednesday afternoon (~1 week after the original packing/moving took place) that the delivery would be done the following day. This was 2 days before the tentative date that was given to me for delivery (and thus the date I started my new lease). When I spoke to Ms. Miller about this problem and asked why nobody updated me on the new delivery date, I was told that it was out of her hands and that the driver did not update Smith Dray Line administration on his progress for the move. I informed her that the apartment would not be ready with only one day notice, however had I known even a couple days earlier, I could have made the apartment ready for that date. She told me that since the apartment could not be ready in 1 day, my only option was to put everything in storage for the 2 days and then have it redelivered. This would cost ~$900 extra dollars. I informed her that I thought it was inappropriate for me to have to pay so much money in storage fees when the problems with delivery could have easily been avoided had someone just communicated an updated delivery date with me. She was able to speak with her supervisor and give me a little discount, but I still ended up having to pay a little over $700 extra for a problem that occurred due to either miscommunication or a lack of communication between the drivers/administration and then with me.
Save yourself a significant amount of money and frustration by using other movers. It may be possible this was a one off, but it's not worth the risk. read more