After two of the most stressful and physically taxing days that I can ever remember, we are finally on our way to our new life in Ontario. Last night, Nov 26th, we watched as the 40' container was finally loaded to the brim with nearly all of our household and personal possessions. It was unexpectedly full!
The tips I have to share with you is to go with a moving broker instead of a moving company. The broker does a lot of the footwork for you to get you the best rate. The moving broker we used was able to get the move done by volume (container size) rather than by weight. In our case, it was more economical to use this method. There are some things you should know if you use a brokerage.
The biggest drawback for us was the laws change province to province. House closing is at noon the same day if you are in Alberta. Not so in Ontario. Don't plan on getting into your new house the same day that it closes. We caused ourselves a lot of undo stress because we didn't know that.
Also make sure even if you hire a brokerage that you repeat your expectations and follow up. We had a few issues.
Leaving Alberta;
On the first day of packing, the packing team did not finish packing because they said they ran out of supplies.
On the second day when movers came, the loaders had to finish packing a large quantity of stuff left unpacked from the first day. The manager was not seem pleased that his packing team didn't stay longer to pack on the first day.
The actual wrapping of goods in boxes appears to have been really good except for a couple of boxes that I think they may have rushed through. We had carpet cleaners scheduled at 1:00 on Friday. We were told this would not conflict with the packing because they would be done by then. We had to ask the carpet cleaners to come back at 5:00 that day because the loaders were still clearing out rooms. Even when the carpet cleaners came back at 5:00, the loaders were still clearing out rooms one step ahead of the carpet cleaners.
Other than that, the packing and loading went well, just very long hours. We didn't get to clean up and leave until 9:00 that evening.
Arriving Ontario:
The truck driver got lost and had to call us for directions. Keep in mind, we barely know our way around.
The unloading team were given the wrong street name from the moving company and had to also contact us to get accurate address and directions. These were local guys who know the area but couldn't find the house because of misinformation. The biggest issue I found with the communication was in telling their unloading team that they didn't need a ramp to unload because the container would be on the ground – it was on the back of a semi 5 to 6 feet in the air. These poor guys had to unload the entire 40' container and pallet BY HAND. This was insane and in my opinion was a safety issue but they were fabulous and somehow they got it done. The other issue was that they did NOT bring any floor protectors like the red carpets I asked about when following up. The original packing and loading team in Alberta brought red carpet runners to lay down to protect the floor but the Ontario team didn't have those and the poor guys took their shoes off every time they came into the house, which impressed me a lot. They were wonderful despite their company's miscommunications.
Our only other issue, which was quickly resolved, was minor damage to a couple of furniture pieces.
