Direct Connect Auto Transport

We paid $200 extra for expedited pick-up before he left Chicago. They did not show up on time so he had to find a friend to meet them and hand over the car after his flight had left for LA. So this was a waste of money, but only the beginning of the problems. The car carrier containing our car broke down just as it arrived in LA and was towed to a company to fix it. Our car sat on the car carrier FOR THREE WEEKS while repeated attempts failed to repair it so the vehicles could be removed and delivered to owners. My son was promised SIX TIMES the truck would be fixed and delivered the next day but was always told the attempt to fix it had failed and another attempt would have to take place in a couple of days after more parts were delivered to repair the car carrier. Meanwhile, my son spent $400 in Uber fares to get to his new job for 3 weeks. The company didn't keep us informed and didn't seem to know what the problem was with the repair. We had to repeatedly call the driver and mechanic ourselves to attempt to learn what was going on. Our car was just hostage for three weeks. The car carrier was finally fixed and our car was delivered to my son in CA three weeks late. We demanded our money back and were promised a refund for this horrible service, but never received anything. I have called them repeatedly but they have stopped communicating with us.

Overall Rating: Good Direct Connect price quote for our auto transport was +$100 higher than quotes we received from other auto transport companies*. We decided to go with Direct Connect because the representative informed us they 'owned' their auto carriers / trucks. This was a selling point since they said the other companies act as brokers, and in turn hire outside auto carriers to transport the vehicles. (We're not clear if S T Auto Carriers, which is the company that picked up and delivered our car is "owned" by Direct Connect, or if DC acted as brokers in this case; regardless, we are satisfied with the service.) *Direct Connect did not match the lower competitor prices as requested, but they did reduce their price by $50. The service was advertised as 'door-to-door'. However, six days after they picked up our car in FL, the driver called us to let us know he was close to the delivery destination, and he said his truck was too big to enter the town. He asked us to meet him in a neighboring town, but since we didn't have a way to get there, he offered to pick us up (in our vehicle), and we gave him a ride back to his truck. The reason we rated "Responsiveness" as "Fair" in the Ratings section is because we tried calling the customer service line during the weekend, and the representative who picked up couldn't help us with our inquiry. We then submitted a query via the company's online query system (Zendesk) and we didn't receive a response. The ticket is still open in their system (16 days after submission), so it does not look like the Zendesk inquiries are being monitored by the Direct Connect representatives.

I recently moved from Fernley, NV to Coral Springs, Florida and opted to fly and have my car shipped. Direct Connect Auto Transport was located in Fort Lauderdale, offered door to door service, and seemed like the logical choice, so we decided to give them a shot. I booked my reservation approximately 20 days in advance ( 3-7 days notice was required according to the customer service representative). Once the delivery date was scheduled, I was told that the company would contact me to give me a window of time when my car would be picked up on my requested date, which was the morning of the day I was getting on a plane (red-eye flight). Several weeks passed with no word, I called the day prior to my departure to check on the status of my pick-up, but the person I needed to speak to was not available and was told someone would call back. I did receive a call back and was told that the pick-up would occur as schedule on the morning of our departure day. The scheduled pick-up window came and went, no one ever showed up. I then called again to follow up on the status of the pick-up. I was told that the pick-up truck was en route from either Sacramento or Las Vegas. A few hours later, I was then told that our pick-up truck would be unable to pick-up our vehicle as scheduled due to maintenance issues and that our vehicle could not be picked up until the following day. Our case manager or Consultant apologized for the inconvinience and offered to compensate us with $200.00 off of the shipment costs. At this point it was late afternoon and I had to worry about making it to the airport to catch my flight. I had no choice but to leave my vehicle with a trusted neighbor. Direct Connect Auto Transport finally picked up my car the following day. We were told that our vehicle would take approximately 5 days to arrive to Florida and that the only truck available to pick it up would be a truck which was encased. She then had the nerve to charge up for this upgrade, we refused to pay for the upgrade and insisted that we have already been severely inconvenienced. On the 4th day we called the company to follow up, we find out that our vehicle has been sitting at a Tow Yard in Las Vegas Nevada the entire time. Since no one contacted me, I assumed everything was running smoothly and without further delay. I've never been more mistaken in my life. I immediately demanded to speak with management, I was transferred and was placed on hold for approximately 20 minutes. I never got through. My wife and I decided to speak to management in person at their Fort Lauderdale Office and let them know that their poor level of service and professionalism was unacceptable. Management was apparently unavailable. We did however, personally confront our "Consultant" who is responsible for this nightmare. She was not helpful whatsoever, she had no idea where our vehicle was and appeared clueless. At that point, we were actually assisted by another Consultant that was not even assigned to our case. She made inquiries and placed several phone calls to track down our vehicle on the spot, basically did our consultants job for her. She confirmed that our vehicle was indeed just sitting at a Tow Yard in Las Vegas and would not be picked up for another couple of days. I told Direct Connect I was very upset and that I needed my car in order to get to work in find a residence. They told me they understood and apologized and told me they were doing everything they could. Direct Connect recently contacted us to seek further financial compensation because apparently our vehicle is too heavy, we refuse and reminded them of the inconvenience we've undergone. It's been approximately 13 days and our vehicle has yet to arrive.