Woo Hoo! Screw "U"!

[athelind]

For those of you following our our ongoing moving fiasco in quelonzia's journal, you'll be happy to know that Quel has gotten a truck -- a 24' truck, no less, so we may actually be able to move all of Younger Daughter's belongings in one swell foop, along with a decent chunk of Older Daughter's, as well.

We did not get this truck through The Big Name In Truck Rental, despite having made reservations twice. The BNITR would only allow us to take a truck From Marina To San Jose, period -- no trucks in Marina? Too bad, so sad, now get off the line, don't call us, we'll call you. That's literal, BTW -- they insisted that they'd call us when a truck became available, resulting in two days of wasted dithering by the telephone. When we asked about the possibility of renting a truck up here, driving it down to Marina to load it up, moving the stuff up to the new place and returning the truck up here, they said "No way. We'll have to charge you two one-way fees."

Please note that they wanted to double-charge us because they could not provide the equipment we needed, where we needed it, despite our reservations.

Their Erstwhile Competitors, however, were much more amenable. They had no problem with our picking up a truck here in San Jose and making the round trip to Marina and back. They're just charging us the "local" rate -- and even with the $.45/mile milage fee, we're still only going to be paying about as much as we would have for TBNITR's promises of a truck that never appeared.

TBNITR managed to snag us for a $5 "Non-Refundable Service Fee" twice, though, for the two reservations we wound up canceling. It's like spam, only in reverse. You only need to actually fill the needs of a fraction of your customers, it seems -- with enough gullible suckers impressed by a name that's become a generic, like "Kleenex" or "Pop-Tarts", you can make a killing off of "service fees" for services you never actually manage to tender.

And yes, Your Obedient Serpent is @home, packing books and more dragons. Quel and I get to move a week from today.

And we've got our reservation with the Erstwhile Competitors.

Comments

[archteryx.livejournal.com]

Good for you, Athe!

I do admit to using U-Haul in the past, mostly because they were far cheaper then the 'erstwhile competitor' by several factors for cross-country trips. For local moves, tho, I won't touch 'em.

Your idea to use a truck 'locally' for what is, in fact, a cross-country move was quite good. I'll have to remember it in the future, so long as the move isn't TOO long. (May be impractical to do this for a Ohio to California move ;)

-- ArchTeryx

[athelind.livejournal.com]

I dunno. Given that Quel COMMUTED that distance five days a week for five years, maybe it IS reasonable to call it a "local" move.

[ceruleanst.livejournal.com]

You shouldn't use them for long distances, either. They're waiting for the truck to fall apart en route so they can blame you for it and suck you dry with exorbitant repair fees. They have been known to falsify weighings and hold cargo (i.e. everything you own) for ransom. And then anyone who lives to tell the story on the web will be sued into oblivion for "violating trademark."

[arcturax.livejournal.com]

U-Haul is evil, they ripped me off once too. I won't use them anymore.

[ceruleanst.livejournal.com]

Are you the one who sent me the U-Hell link before I moved? Do you have any idea if that story survived somewhere?

[arcturax.livejournal.com]

Hmm, let me check the great internet oracle...

http://home.earthlink.net/~rockisle/files/uhaul.htm

There we go :)

[arcturax.livejournal.com]

Ahh, that musta been back in the days of the newsgroup, wow, I haven't heard from you in ages! How goes? Didn't know you had a journal now :)

[independence161.livejournal.com]

I've heard nothing but bad things about U-Haul.

[hafoc.livejournal.com]

Ya mind giving details about the new domicile, how well you like it, what the commute is like, and all that kind of stuff, once you know? Compulsively worrying minds want to know! :D

Congrats on getting the truck thing straightened out.

I have bad memories about U-Hauls because I drove one pretty much across the country-- twice. Unless I'm mixing my trips up. (I also hauled equipment in pickups once or twice.) Thing drove me crazy-- it is not exactly the most comfortable vehicle for cross-country work, and besides, it had a governor that limited it to 60 mph or so. All right, I suppose speeding is Bad, but just try getting through city freeway traffic- or passing somebody else, who takes it as a challenge the instant you pull alongside-- in a truck with a governor to cut the engine out once you get one lousy mph over the limit. It was not pleasant.

I have great pity for people driving U-Hauls as if they were idiots, because odds are the equipment is forcing them to do so.

[normanrafferty.livejournal.com]

I endorse "Two Guys and a Truck". Professional movers go a long way, IMO.

[athelind.livejournal.com]

Alas, they want money. Which we sorely lack.

[archteryx.livejournal.com]

Bingo. That's the ONLY reason I went anywhere near U-Haul, for anything. Money. If you don't have the $700 to pay Ryder what U-Haul offered to do for $175...sometimes, you have to gamble. I gambled, and won. But I recognize next time I may not be so lucky.

-- ArchTeryx