Moving Companies Need Better Standards

(Aired on July 22, 2010)

Canada's moving companies are trying to decide if they want to adopt a bill of rights to protect customers. The proposal would ensure customers receive a written quote and get plenty of notice about delays. The bill would also ensure movers are trained, bonded and have adequate insurance. The new plan would weed out operators who have victimized families moving from one place to another.

But there has to be more than that. Moving is a much more difficult situation than it used to be. Consumer advocates say customers have the responsibility to hire ethical and above-board firms. But how do you know that anymore? It used to be that you could look in the phone book and pick one of the big names you recognized and you could pretty much rest assured you were going to be okay. Not so anymore. Even many of the big moving companies subcontract out the work and there are often all sorts of delays that create nothing but problems.

One of my kids has moved several times because of her husband's job, and each time there have been problems. Frantic phone calls to find out why no one showed up as promised. It added a lot of stress. No matter what firm they picked, they had issues. Most of it had to do with the company keeping their promises to do things by a certain time. There were always delays. And that just isn't good enough. I realize these cross-country haulers can run into problems.

But it seems there are more and more issues trying to get companies to commit to a time line that customers can rely on. I don't know if some kind of bill of rights will help. But it sure can't do any harm.