Lego + Moving Advice

[nanuck95]

As many of you know, I recently went through the experience of having to move somewhat cross-country (600+ miles). I packed some of my Lego, the stuff I knew would be most probably to make a mess or be spilled, and brought it with me when I drove myself here a few weeks ago. The bulk of my collection, stored in snap-top totes went with the movers. Unfortunately I had to start work and was not in Michigan when they loaded up all my stuff last week, so I was not there to supervise how my collection was packed up.

They did not put my snap-top containers into boxes, and several of them tipped, or were jostled around during transit and spilled their contents, which surprised me. As they were unloading things this morning, there were tons of bricks all over the bottom of the truck, and some of them ended up in the street. The movers, trying not to let me see how much damage was done then started randomly shoving bricks into any container they could find, which means I had to re-sort through everything to figure out what I still have and what is missing. So far I have roughly 80 1x4 bricks in various colors that were severely damaged, several arches were badly damaged, 3 Star Wars minifigs are missing helmets, 2 are MIA, and one Tusken Raider was mauled in the face. I still need to go take inventory (which will take weeks) to find out what else is missing.

Anyway, to make a long story short, if you plan on moving, I would highly recommend putting EVERYTHING in cardboard boxes, even if it's already in a snap-top tote. That way it seems like your chances of things tipping or spilling is significantly less, and if it does spill in the box, at least it's still somewhat contained. Or, just move everything yourself if that's possible.

[Heir of Black Falcon]

I agree. I have worked with the moving industry often and can say one thing seems very clear.... this is their job. They do it fast and often without much, if any, care for your things.

Since my family is doing an international (England to California) move at the moment we decided to pack our stuff on our own and we insured it.... I have seen these guys at work. They will throw, kick, drop, slide, etc, your stuff literally until it is at its destination. If you find something amiss and have it insured use it. This is the only real way to protect yourself. The sad thing is that it does not hit the moving company. Really that would be a perfect way for them to realize that ten seconds of care could have saved someone days in time and hundreds of dollars in damages.

That said there are some companies with very good reputations for taking care of your things. Usually they cost 2-3 times what the others do and their return is not always 100% but to me this seems to be the way of it.

I feel your pain. It is very frustrating for that to happen to any of your things let alone Lego stuff!

Heir

[puddleglum]

Sorry to hear about your bad moving experience.

But welcome to Virginia! It's a nice place to live. I don't know if there is an active LUG in Richmond, but just went to my first WAMALUG meeting last Sunday, it was great! It would probably be a 2 hour drive for you, but definitely worth it once a month. (Especially since it's right around the corner from the LEGO Store in Tyson's Corner! )

As it happens, I'm leaving for the annual summer vacation with family at Torch Lake, MI on Saturday.

[JoshWedin]

That really stinks. I'm sorry. I'd be really angry.

Josh

[Memsochet]

I don't know what kind of insurance or guarantee you had on your stuff, but I would definitely file a formal complaint. If it was a cross country move, then I am assuming that the moving company was probably a national chain/company. If so then they also should be able to compensate you for your loss. I would take an inventory and find out the value of the lost/damaged pieces then send them a bill. If they refuse to pay, I'd take them to small claims(if less than the cost of a lawyer) or strait sue them.

[nanuck95]

It was a cross-country move that was paid for by my new employer. It is a fairly large moving company and they do have a pretty fair claims department. Supposedly they are sending out someone on Tuesday to check out what's been damaged (we had a couple pieces of furniture with minor damages that we claimed as well). I estimated the cost to replace all the parts as I don't exactly know all of what's lost yet. I think I did a decent job, the biggest hit was I had to replace 5 or 6 SW figs, which ran about $8 each as they are older figs and harder to get. Plus I bought them all at the same BL store so while I paid a little more for a few of them than I probably should have, I didn't end up paying a ton on shipping.

Overall, I don't think I'll have any problem getting compensation to make things right, it's just a big hassle that I probably could have avoided had I been a little smarter about it. But, you live and learn, and hopefully my mistake will help someone else avoid the same mess.

[porschecm2]

Oh that sounds like a nightmare come true. I feel for you. I hope you're able to get proper reparations.

Cm2

[Foamrider]

I've moved a couple times with my LEGO, and during the whole process I was very paranoid. I'm pretty negative about movers in general already(Ok, fine. Just negative), but the idea that I could find my possessions damaged or "lost" at the end of the journey, really freaked me out. Despite having everything securely packed into boxes. Now compared to you, it seems I got off pretty easy. Only failed to receive a number of fine minifigs.

I hope that your other things came away unscathed, and I wish you luck in dealing with those dirty, thieving, buffoons.

[Memsochet]

While I've moved a lot as a kid, that was all my parent's business, and only twice did we have movers actually move us(once to a temp apt while we found a house, and then into the house we found). So if anything ever got damaged/lost it was our fault(we actually left an entire box of original G.I. Joes and vehicles once). But the last time I personally moved I had help from my dad & one of my brothers. All my stuff made it, but I wanted to kill my brother. I had taken all my MOCs and set them aside to be hand carried separately to my new place. He thought it would be a good idea to put them all in a giant comforter bag, when I told him what I wanted to do, he started removing them from it. As he lifted the largest MOC(a 2-3' space ship) he held in the wrong spot, and it snapped in 2, then fell to the ground and shattered. Needless to say, after that it didn't matter how my Legos got to their new home. Nothing like a fresh build.

[moose]

And I supose that some rare elment was lost too, If that happend to me i would most likely be in shock for a year