I have sort of set up my desktop right now.  It is hooked up to the TV for a monitor, and I am using the tiny Bluetooth keyboard.  It’s difficult to type on, compared to my lovely, ergonomic keyboard, but better than tapping on my phone, so I will finally attempt to pass on the ongoing debacle with our movers.

Why, you may ask, do I have this strange set up for my computer?

Well, we took only the most important parts of our computers – the towers and the monitors – with us for the drive.  Things we didn’t want sitting in a moving van.  Our keyboards and monitor stands, as well as other items, are packed in boxes.

In storage.

Somewhere.

We did not expect to have to wait so long for our stuff, but once my older daughter and I arrived, it was clear we simply could not move our own stuff into the house.  It was too full of my parents’ stuff.  My younger daughter helped install the washer and dryer,  but was not in a position to know what to pack.  The easy answer is “everything”, but of course, there are always exceptions, and I’m really the only person who would recognize what those are.

So I emailed the movers as soon as I could, asking for our items to be put into storage, explaining the situation.  I asked for a drop off date of around the 11th of December.

The initial response I got was that sure, they could put our stuff into storage, once the bill is paid up front.  Oh, and the bill was almost $6000.  About $2000 more than I expected.  With instructions on how to pay the bill, by credit card (which had a 3% surcharge tacked on, or other methods.

I didn’t, however, get a bill.  Just a total.

No response about the delivery period requested, either.

The contract stipulated up to 5 weeks free storage, so I objected to their demanding payment before storing our stuff.  Particularly since the amount was more than my mother had given me to pay for the movers in the first place, and we had to use some of that for other moving expenses.  So we had to at least wait until my husband’s disability payments came in at the end of the month, to cover the balance.

I responded, quoting the portion of the contract about the free storage.  I also requested an itemized bill and asked why the amount was so high.

I got a reply with a jpg of the “bill” – the sheet I signed with the mover the day everything was packed up, except the weight information and costs were added, including the cost of a “full pack”, and the delivery of ASAP was crossed out and “storage” was written in.  I wasn’t able to open it on my phone, though.  I ended up having to forward the email to my husband.  He was able to open it, then use the magic of near beam transfer technology to send it to my phone.  Only then could I open the image and see the bill.

The subject of the email said my questions would be answered below.  But there was no new message.  Finally, after going through the previous response, line by line, I found where she had added in info about how the bill would need to be paid in full at the end of the 5 weeks storage, then how much storage per month would cost if we wanted them to continue storage.  Because of how she added the info in, it looked like it was part of an older response she gave me.

Not impressed.

My husband had phoned them and left a message.  It took about a week for them to call back.  I had a bunch of issues I mentioned to him that he brought up, but according to her, the movers themselves didn’t see any issues at all.  Duh.  Of course they would say that.  Also, apparently a “partial pack” would have cost us much, much more, because they itemize everything, etc.  So that’s why we got charged for a full pack.

Which seems incredibly counterintuitive.

Whatever.  Our stuff was in storage and we could focus on working on the house.

When it got to the point where we could see the light of day, and found we really, really needed our own stuff, I sent another email, asking about being able to get our stuff a bit earlier, like around the 8th.

The response I got was that they could deliver between the 15th and the 20th, but that they wouldn’t load things onto the truck again until full payment was made, or confirmation of payment was made.

Not impressed.

I responded by saying we could pay by etransfer, in two payments, because of the limit my bank puts on them.  I also asked why such a late date, considering that when I asked about a delivery of the 11th, that part never got a response.  I told them we  needed our stuff before the 15th.

The response I got?  I was informed that it would be okay to make the two payments by etransfer, because they knew some people had limits to deal with (how gracious of them), and that she would contact the warehouse to see if they could deliver earlier.

That was two days ago.

With still no response today, my husband phoned them again.  He was told she would call us back when she got the information from the warehouse manager.

Uh huh.

At this point, my jaded first response is that they are hanging onto our stuff until past the 5 week grace period, so they can charge us for storage.

The thing is, we don’t even know where our stuff is.  It is most likely in The City, but for all we know, it’s not even in this province.  Getting information from these people is like pulling teeth.

I am not impressed.

We really need our stuff.  And we really need to know when the movers are going to arrive, because we will need to take out the beds we are using right now, to make room for our own, at the very least.

Plus, it’ll be nice to have more clothes than what we were able to pack into our suitcases.  And knives with edges on them.  And my daughter really, really needs her art supplies.

We might even be able to put up our Christmas tree.

The Re-farmer