02-20-2009, 06:54 AM
After six weeks of waiting for our household goods... the container arrived yesterday and movers were here from 8 am till 7:30 pm unloading and setting up stuff. Now that the container is unloaded, I must say I was hugely impressed with the move by Westpoint. Their price was $13,000 less than our highest bid from a traditional moving company (Westpoint only does moves to and from Hawaii and Japan) on the mainland and $8,000 less than our lowest and third bid. I was a little nervous when into the bidding process, they said, "What will it take to get your business?" (price-wise) and when they took the number I offered. There had been two negative postings I read on Konaweb & Punaweb about them and because they were offering full service for such a cheap (REALLY not CHEAP, but far less than anyone else was willing to offer). It was a huge move and we had a lot of high end art and a few antiques to be concerned about. So far, everything came through unscathed except a small chip to a stone table top. There are still lots of boxes to unpack, but I have unpacked two of the large dish packs they packed and everything was in pristine shape.
The California crew (one supervisor and 8 men for two very long days) is to be praised for packing and prepping everything so superbly. All of our furniture was wrapped with four layers of protection, and completely sealed in plastic. I was worried about my 300 year old Russian Farm table, which is 14' long and does not have a single nail in it and it made the trip just fine. Another piece, an iron and glass art table also made it through perfectly. It is actually quite amazing how well they packed everything and how they filled the 45' "high top" container so perfectly. Of course when they opened it and I saw that we could have fit at least 5' X 9' more stuff in it, I was bummed. We had a shuttle from our house, so we were unsure if our stuff even would all fit in the container so I decided to leave behind a lot of pottery and my Caja China (Cuban Pig Roaster which I gave to my next door neighbor) because I was sure it would not fit.
The delivery/set up crew arrived on time, Three big Samoans from the Honolulu office were as efficient as a larger crew could be. They flew in and rented a U-Haul for the shuttle service from the road down our driveway to the house. They worked hard all day and we helped them a bit. They were excellent at carrying everything to the right rooms, but because we had so much protection on all of the furniture they did not have time to unwrap everything. They did get our bed put together and that was a serious treat, as we had been sleeping on the old guest room mattress and box springs that the sellers left here. Sleeping in our bed last night was like sleeping in a cloud, albeit a cloud surrounded by boxes… but a cloud no less.
Anyway, because there had been earlier questions by people about Westpoint, I just wanted to say we had an entirely great experience with them and the price was right! I can compare it to the corporate move we made from IL to CA in December of 2006. We got just as good of service from Westpoint as we did from United Van Lines franchisees. We had a difficult move on both ends, lots of furniture, odd sized items and art as well as my ceramic studio. Our house in CA was on a mountain and had to be ferried and here we had a short ferry between the house and container. I would highly recommend them for a move to or from the mainland. If you are dealing with the West Coast office, ask for Frank. He was a great salesperson and coordinator. If you are moving from the Bay area, Luiz was a real gem as the supervisor for the job. He personally oversaw all of the protection of our antiques and art, most of which had to be custom crated for protection.
The only downside was that the Honolulu office was a bit short on communication skills. I had to call several times to get the move set up and when they said they would call back for confirmation etc. they did not call back. Almost every time I called them, I got a voice mail and that was frustrating. But a call in to Frank in the LA office always got immediate attention. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me
By the way we brought both of our cars over with PASHA and were thrilled with the service. They also communicated with us via e-mail to let us know where our cars were along the way. And they arrived with zero damage and right on time for only $1,000 each.
Aloha au i Hawai`i,
devany
www.eastbaypotters.com
www.myhawaiianhome.blogspot.com
The California crew (one supervisor and 8 men for two very long days) is to be praised for packing and prepping everything so superbly. All of our furniture was wrapped with four layers of protection, and completely sealed in plastic. I was worried about my 300 year old Russian Farm table, which is 14' long and does not have a single nail in it and it made the trip just fine. Another piece, an iron and glass art table also made it through perfectly. It is actually quite amazing how well they packed everything and how they filled the 45' "high top" container so perfectly. Of course when they opened it and I saw that we could have fit at least 5' X 9' more stuff in it, I was bummed. We had a shuttle from our house, so we were unsure if our stuff even would all fit in the container so I decided to leave behind a lot of pottery and my Caja China (Cuban Pig Roaster which I gave to my next door neighbor) because I was sure it would not fit.
The delivery/set up crew arrived on time, Three big Samoans from the Honolulu office were as efficient as a larger crew could be. They flew in and rented a U-Haul for the shuttle service from the road down our driveway to the house. They worked hard all day and we helped them a bit. They were excellent at carrying everything to the right rooms, but because we had so much protection on all of the furniture they did not have time to unwrap everything. They did get our bed put together and that was a serious treat, as we had been sleeping on the old guest room mattress and box springs that the sellers left here. Sleeping in our bed last night was like sleeping in a cloud, albeit a cloud surrounded by boxes… but a cloud no less.
Anyway, because there had been earlier questions by people about Westpoint, I just wanted to say we had an entirely great experience with them and the price was right! I can compare it to the corporate move we made from IL to CA in December of 2006. We got just as good of service from Westpoint as we did from United Van Lines franchisees. We had a difficult move on both ends, lots of furniture, odd sized items and art as well as my ceramic studio. Our house in CA was on a mountain and had to be ferried and here we had a short ferry between the house and container. I would highly recommend them for a move to or from the mainland. If you are dealing with the West Coast office, ask for Frank. He was a great salesperson and coordinator. If you are moving from the Bay area, Luiz was a real gem as the supervisor for the job. He personally oversaw all of the protection of our antiques and art, most of which had to be custom crated for protection.
The only downside was that the Honolulu office was a bit short on communication skills. I had to call several times to get the move set up and when they said they would call back for confirmation etc. they did not call back. Almost every time I called them, I got a voice mail and that was frustrating. But a call in to Frank in the LA office always got immediate attention. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me
By the way we brought both of our cars over with PASHA and were thrilled with the service. They also communicated with us via e-mail to let us know where our cars were along the way. And they arrived with zero damage and right on time for only $1,000 each.
Aloha au i Hawai`i,
devany
www.eastbaypotters.com
www.myhawaiianhome.blogspot.com
Aloha au i Hawai`i,
devany
www.SassySpoon.wordpress.com
www.myhawaiianhome.blogspot.com
www.EastBayPotters.com
devany
www.SassySpoon.wordpress.com
www.myhawaiianhome.blogspot.com
www.EastBayPotters.com