Review Report Review
NJ to CA shipment

Seth Submitted this review about Stateway Auto Transport
Review made Live: 8/24/2010 6:09:00 PM
I will start out on the bright side. The M3 convertible made it from New Jersey to California successfully and the driverfrom J.V. Brothers Trucking was very nice and thorough in transporting the car and giving me his progress.

This is the first (and hopefully last) time I have to ship a car cross country.

The whole process is not very effective and Stateway might just be the brunt of a bad overall system.

I received a quote of $885 to transport my car and called Stateway to confirm on July 2nd that it would be picked up from a summer home in South New Jersey between Thursday July 29 - Monday morning August 1st. I informed them that I was flying to California on August 1st and noone would be there so I could not leave the car keys with anyone. They provided me with a very nice e-mail that they will be placing the order and assigning to a truck as soon as possible so I could have peace of mind that the pick-up will occur as scheduled

When I arrived in NJ on July21st I called Anthony my point of contact at Stateway about 3 times and finally connected with him the following day. I was rather terse with him because he had not returned my calls at which time he got angry and called me a liar and that he always returns his call that day and that I was mistaken. Because I needed to have the car shipped, I made nice and placated him to find out the status of my pickup for the next week

Anthony informed me "how the system works". The assignment to trucks does not happen until the week of the pickup and there are no guarantees of getting your auto picked up. Pick ups are based on price and most occur on Mon-Wed thus my car might not be able to be picked up on the days requested. He personally would follow up with me as soon as he had information to provide me with pick up time and date.

As expected, I still had not heard from Anthony as of July 28th and called to see what was happening. He informed me that due to my low price, he was unable to accomodate my required pick-up and gave me an option to drive the car to a local BMW car dealer where they could hold onto the car until a pick-up could be arranged (of course no guarantee ship date). I asked him if increasing the price $50 to $935 would help and he immediately processed this and told me he would get back to me.

On Friday July 30th I was able to talk to the head of dispatch (but I can't remember her name - Suzanne?) who was extremely helpful. She noted that she remembered taking my order and would make sure a truck was assigned before she left that night for the weekend. I received a call at 7:00 PM and was told that a truck had been assigned and the problem was that the original truck had broken down thus the issues.

When the trucking company called they asked if I could drive somewhere 15 minutes away at 7:00 in order to start the transport. I was extremely happy and was willing to do whatever to get the car to the carrier. Finally met the carrier in a parking lot with 2 other people that were transporting to CA.

I waited a week to contact the carrier and found out he was a day away from San Diego. He contacted me the next day and I met him to pick up the car.

The car arrived with no problems in San Diego area and he requested I give him the $1000 that I owed him to release the car. Luckily, I brought extra money just in case there was a problem while picking up the car. The original quote was $885 plus the $50 adder equals - $935 less the $160 charged by Stateway I should have been paying $775 at time of pick up. (the 2nd quote received by Stateway after the extra $50 noted that the deposit was only$30 but I think my card was already charged $160)

I have tried to contact Stateway 3 or 4 times via e-mail and one time via voice and cannot get them to return my call to explain the price differential. Is this comonplace in the industry or specific I do not know. (maybe someone will contact me after reading this review)

I am happy that the car made it to the west coast safely, but not satisfied with Stateway - especially with the feeling of bait and switch with the money situation and lack of follow-up.
Shipment Details
Origin State:
New Jersey
Pickup:
Late
Destination State:
California
Delivery:
On Time
Customer Service
Honesty:
Knowlegeable:
Promptness:
Customer Service:
Review Details
Quote or Order Id:
Anthony
Quote or Order Cost:
$885