Moving practicalities

I'm planning my move for this summer, and finding a few things very helpful so want to pass them on in case anyone else does:

- Movingscam.org has reviews of different moving options. The site's somewhat unfortunate name came about because someone had their belongings ransomed by moving companies, and when they started looking into the consumer issues, they found many moving companies gave low estimates and then raised them once the move was in progress and it was too late for the customer to back out. One story that I read there had a woman actually decide to forfeit her belongings rather than pay the several thousand dollars that the moving company requested from her.

They recommend a very small number of services --- full service, cargo shipping/partial trailer, relocubes, and self-driven moving vans --- and their motto seems to be "if you want it done right, do it yourself." From reading their stories, I understand this perspective.

- ABF UPack has been consistently friendly and helpful in all of my planning for different moving scenarios: they email quotes right away almost all the time and show which days are cheaper, and if you call they will tell you the price difference between different days. The other relocube places are less responsive and the people I spoke with seem more like salespeople. Upack customer service people haven't tried to pressure me at all, and they answered all my questions and explained the options, and all five of the people I've spoken with in the past two years at their depot terminals and customer service were just extremely friendly and helpful. Moving isn't their main business --- they're a cargo shipper --- so that may explain the difference from the other places. (I tried to use them for my move last year, but due to parking regulations in my current city, I wasn't able to.)

Also they gave me a $50 discount for mentioning the above website when I called them after making my reservation. I had thought that mentioning the website gave the website some funding for referrals, and hadn't expected a discount, but it turns out that it gives a discount.