Read's Moving System

Overall pretty good. A few dings to furniture here and there but overall it went fine. They used furniture touch paint to fix on spot in most cases. Moving is very stressful but these guys were calm and very responsive to our requests. They did their best to protect floors and stairs but still found a few wall marks/dings later. John Mentel provided us a bunch of used boxes for free which were really appreciated. So as far as moved goes I think it went pretty well.

We moved with Read's moving company. We scheduled a big move from one city to another in South Carolina. But, because we had had a bad experience with another company (with furniture damaged), I asked specifically whether the people who would handle our move were subcontractors or regular, trained employees. We did not want to deal with subcontractors again. I was assured that the people handling the move were employees and had been well trained. Because my husband already had a one bedroom apartment in the city to which we were moving, we added on a "pick up", which meant they would stop by and pick up his things on the way to our new house. But because we had contractors laying floor in our new house, we decided to postpone the big move, so that the apartment move came first, two weeks before the big move. We also added on the full packing service to the local move. I have back problems and my husband also occasionally has back pain. We decided to make it easier on ourselves. With our big intrastate move, the salesman told me adding the packing service included a free unpacking service and box takeaway. Because we added the packing service to the apartment move, even though it was now separate from my big move, I had understood we would have unpacking is well, which was a big reason we upgraded to the full packing service. When moving day came, it could not have gone more wrong. Read's people were scheduled to show up between 9:00 and 11:00. At 10:00, only two movers, not packers, showed up, having waited since 9:00 in the parking lot because Read's had told him we wouldn't be on site until 10:00 (which was not true; we were there all morning, packing up food and cleaning supplies that they don't pack). The subcontractor had been told by Read's that we would have everything packed. He said the move was supposed to take only three hours, and that's what he would be paid for, but it looked like it would be much longer. And, he had another job scheduled that would not allow him to stay in pack, he thought. He was quite agitated and reasonably so. I called our salesman to try to address what seemed to be a misunderstanding. He made some calls and discovered the office had not updated the paperwork, even though he had called to confirm the day before that we were to have packers (a full service move). It was frustrating, especially to my husband, but I assured him we would still be able to get it done with all of us working. My husband and I were packing as fast as we could and the movers started taking things down into the truck. About 45 minutes later, the salesman arrived with the boxes and packing materials and the movers started packing. It was not the plan I had in mind, but it was still going to be okay. I noticed the movers occasionally banging our wooden furniture against the rails as they took it down two flights of stairs to the truck. I asked one of them to be careful, we were less concerned about speed than not having damage. When the salesman arrived with the boxes, he reiterated my request to be careful to the movers. I arrived to our new home before the movers. When they arrived, one of them told me he had been circling the neighborhood because Read's had transposed some numbers in our address. It was still early afternoon so it was going to be fine. Then, when most things were in the house, and it was time to unpack (I thought), I discovered that the movers did not know anything about unpacking. One said, "we don't normally do that." By this time, I was upset. We hadn't gotten the help we thought we were paying for in the morning, and, to add insult to injury, we weren't getting the help we thought we had paid for on the back end. In addition, one of the movers was agitated and expressed his concern that he would be doing the move for free. He was very concerned about whether the company would pay him and, inappropriately, discussing these matters with us. Our contract was with Read's. His contract was with Read's, not us. Added stress. Then, toward the end, one of the movers got a leg cramp. These things can't be helped and we don't fault him. I rushed to get a heating pad and aspirin, but my husband did have to carry our bed upstairs with the one still able–bodied other mover. When I called the salesman, upset that we weren't getting the unpacking service I thought we had paid for, he explained that "most customers don't want that," especially frustrating since he and I had already had a conversation about that with our big move (which included the apartment pick up) and I had specifically asked for it then, since packing supposedly came with a free unpacking service. Anyway, he said he had not written it down and I needed to specify it for the small move. Maddening. The best he could do was to offer to pick up the boxes and packing materials that we unpacked the next day,. We also discovered when we unpacked that the movers had packed the dishwasher silverware holder (that goes with the apartment dishwasher). By the end of the day, according to my husband's Fitbit, he had climbed 54 flights of stairs and walked 17,000 steps. I wasn't wearing a Fitbit but mine would have showed something similar. My back hurt that night. The "easy" move we thought we paid for was pretty labor-intensive--for us. My husband has moved many times (per a military career) and this was one of the least professional moves he's experienced. What we've learned is that Reads does use contractors for local moves and that affects the quality of service (they can't control how they handle furniture or what they say to customers), but they also had communications problems, internally and with us, their customers. Then, when we got the bill it was more than double what they quoted (an estimate)! After talking with an office person, who talked with our salesman, what came to light is that they had double billed us for two hours---those two hours were billed at the moving labor rate when they were actually spent packing boxes (which is billed at a per box rate). That was fixed and we paid our bill, still more than double the original estimate. I would not recommend Read's for a local move. Perhaps the intrastate move would have gone differently, but we couldn't take a chance on getting half the service for double the quote.

Disaster  of a move from Charleston to Sarasota Florida. Furniture arrived damaged. Boxes arrived crushed with many broken pieces. Items missing. Not much of a response from dispatcher or anyone else .No explanation of why the boxes arrived in such bad condition. I would advise you look some where else for a mover.

UP DATE

Reads has contacted me and promised to fix al the damaged goods . I will update again when work is completed

Everything was handled professionally from the scheduling to the actual move.  John Mentel scheduled the move and provided some used boxes at no charge.  The movers (Chris, Frank, and Pete) arrived on time and were extremely friendly, professional, and efficient.  We did most of the packing on our own, but the movers handled some large items including furniture and beds.  For every piece of furniture that was taken apart, all small pieces (screws, bolts, etc.) were attached to the pieces of furniture, so nothing was lost.  We were pleased to see that the movers finished ahead of the scheduled end time, which reduced our moving expenses.  We would not hesitate to use Reads again and would definitely request the team of Chris, Frank, and Pete.

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Awesome service.  John Mentel was a very professional representative, all the movers were very polite and worked efficiently, the driver (Tim), was very good also.  I did shop around for a good company, and so glad I decided to go with Read's.  I also had to reschedule my move dates, and it was no problem.  Highly recommend.

unknown

My POC for receiving my quote and getting my stuff shipped was John Mentel. His office number is 843-285-7374 and his cell is 843-709-5536.
He was super nice, professional, and very thorough. I appreciated the fact that he kept in touch as I prepared for my move.
The driver and loaders showed up on time. They were clean cut, professional, and worked very fast but with care. 
My stuff was delivered to MS on time and the driver and the local MS crew of loaders were professional as well.
My overall experience was excellent and I will definitely use them in the future.

There was a lot of damage to antiques. The moving company won't reimburse me for the damages, so I'm going to end up taking them to small claims court. The company was trying to blame me for the fact that it was damaged because, apparently, if it were in good shape, we wouldn't have even had to worry about it being damaged.