Preventing a Crash Landing
While our "crash landing" does not involve a plane, it does involve a long journey that so far has included theft, illness, and constant hardship. My name is Cassandra and this is the story of my family's journey from Idaho to Pennsylvania and we ended up paying thousands of dollars to lose everything. I know this is a long story but the purpose of this page is to gather donations to help cover lawyer costs to pursue a fraudulent moving company ( US Pro Moving and Logistics) who has lost all our belongings (and not just ours but many people) and has refused to tell us how to for lost items claim (and yes we have reported them to BBB and filed a federal movers fraud claim). We are also seeking donations for helping with my son's medical expenses (he became critically ill 10 days before our medical insurance became active) and for lost income for taking time off work for his hospital stay.
This is our Journey
Takeoff
All our children were born in Idaho and the Northwest was the only place I have ever called home but particularly for my oldest son, pictured on the cover photo, for him the exceedingly dry weather was hard on him. In the summer and winter he'd suffer from chronic nosebleeds. He is autistic and I never really thought he understood what was going on when it got so smoky he couldn't play outside. That was until he said he had a nightmare about Sesame Street being on fire. While I had thought about moving before, I think that was the tipping point for me and when we started making plans to move somewhere that wasn't so dry and smoky. My husband had family in Maryland who had some kids of a similar age to ours so we decided that being able to grow up with cousins was as good of a reason to go to that general location as any, plus the climate was much more suitable. So after I graduated college in December we sold the trailer we were living in which, due to the crazy housing market during the pandemic, sold in less than a week during winter off season, and started our journey east. Little did I know when we were packing our boxes in February that that was going to be the last time I saw any of my belongings again.
Turbulence From The Get Go
When we were looking for a company we had hoped to use PODs because we needed to store our items for a time. Unfortunately they were not available in our area so we started calling around with moving companies that were listed on google. We received an initial quote from US Pro Movers and Logistics of around $3000 total for a full service move with movers that would pack the furniture and store our items all in one service. We would pay $1300 for setting it up, $850 when they loaded the truck and $850 when they delivered it. When we googled them what came up was Pro Movers and Logistics which was a 5 star moving company. We had some very heavy furniture so we thought it would be nice to have professional moving help. Unfortionatly for us, we actuallly signed with US Pro Moving and Logistics which ended up being a very costly mistake. It started with them saying they had a hard time with Credit Cards in Idaho so we had to use our debit card. I realize now that this should have been a dead giveaway that there was something amiss. That became apparent though when the movers got there they said our furniture was larger than they anticipated (Even though we gave the company the physical dimentions of all our items) and it would cost us DOUBLE what they said on the estimate. We had already sold the house and we knew it would cost us more for short notice movers so we grudgingly paid them and moved on with journey east.
Although even the spendy movers said the storage costs would be $150 a month, when I heard from the storage company they demanded more then double the agreed upon price as well. So I had to pay $322 a month through a cash app and they kept insisting I pay for multiple months in advance even though I was hoping to get a job quickly and not need long storage time. I always dreaded when I had to talk to them. They also had me pay via a cash app and never gave me receipt for my payment. After all was said and done, they bullied me into paying more than I actually owed my saying I didn't pay them for one of the previous months. I was having a hard time finding the employment I had hoped for and they just made an already stressful situation and made it so much worse.
Strong Turbulence and Feeling the Engine Die
After a few months my family finally settled in Pennsylvania. A few weeks before move-in I tried contacting the movers to give them the address. It took me almost a week to get a hold of them to get the process moving. When I finally did, it was the end of May. They said that a moving truck would come and get our items between the 6th and 8th of June and would deliver our items to our home. When we signed the contract, the delivery estimate was 7 to 21 days based on the distance our items had to travel. However the call from the truck driver never came.
On June 11th I began sending email inquiries to their Support center and the two costumer service representatives that helped set up our contract. By the end of the following week not a single person had gotten back to me. I called the customer service line and after being on hold for 45 minutes I was told my Items wouldn't be delivered for another two weeks because they had been in storage.
On July 2ed I called them back to get a more exact date since I was planning on being out of town for the 4th of July but when I called them I called the customer service line and after waiting on hold for 45 minutes I was told that the moving company that was used no longer worked for them and because they were no longer in your system I would have to pick up my items at the storage unit so I start stressing because I thought I remembered the storage people saying my items were in Seattle. So I was already mentally freaking out when they went to check on the storage unit address and all I heard was: " How did they.. This is weird, hold on" and I was put on hold. Then the call dropped. My phone does this a lot but last time my phone dropped a call when I was talking to one of your representatives they at least called me back but NOT THIS TIME. So as I was waiting on hold for another 35 minutes I was stressing out thinking of all the thousands of dollars I already spent for moving and storage and that I'd have to pay for another moving company and maybe even fly over there and everything. Well, I get a hold of another costumer service representative and she said that there was a misunderstanding and my stuff was fine and on the way and it would be there in another week. I was getting very weary at this point and emotionally burnt out. My family had been sleeping on mattresses on the floor for more than a month and we only had a weeks worth of clothes each. My husband was experiencing long hours at work due to labor shortages so I calked up the delay to labor shortages but in my gut I knew something was seriously wrong.
Mayday Mayday Going Down!
On July 6th (although no one ever responded to my first complaint) I sent a very grumpy email to their costumer service email that included documentation of my grievances. Although I doubted anyone would respond, I knew having a paper trail showing evidence that I tried to resolve complaints before starting any legal action would be important.
On July 9th fighting with the moving company was left to the back burner as illness struck my oldest child. It seemed like a 24 hour stomach flu and I assumed that after a day or two he would be over the worst of it. But by day 5 he was throwing up so much most of the time he was just dry heaving. He couldn't hold down water at all and was beginning to become non responsive. Normally I would haven taken him to the doctors sooner but our medical insurance didn't become active until my husband was at his job for 60 days and he was still 10 days away from that.
On July 13th I knew my son was in need of serious help and I knew he wasn't going to last another 10 days so I took him to the local urgent care. They did not do IVs for children so they had us go to the hospital down the road that actually had a pediatric ER. After a few tests they found that he was so dehydrated it was actually affecting his kidney function so they checked him into the Children's Hospital. After several more tests they found he had severe intestinal blockage. Though they doubted that could cause the initial illness, it definitely contributed in his inability to stop throwing up.
On July 15th he was discharged from from the hospital. Unfortunately just the day before our youngest son started throwing up which was the beginning of a month-long household illness where everyone got it in their own way and severity. Within a few days my 3 year old's condition deteriorated as well. For him he broke out in a massive viral rash that covered his body.
While my youngest was the only one to go through a serious rash outbreak, also went through some very concerning symptoms such as sudden severe chest pain. My husband had to take time off work on several occasions when my son was in the hospital and when he became sick himself. If that was not bad enough, it was during this time of illness and trial that we found out that our moving company had been lying to us and that our belongings were likely gone forever.
Crash Landing
While we were still battling illness, I was tired of being sick and tired of not having our belongings so on July 20th I reached out to the moving company again to see when our belongings would be delivered. Again I was told my items were stuck in a storage unit and only I could retrieve them. They did not change their mind or lead us along any more but that did not help the fact that supposedly my items were in Denver Colorado while I was in the middle of Pennsylvania. They just gave me an address. No phone number, no storage unit number, not even the name of the storage company. I had to use google maps to figure out what company it was. When I found the place I called them to see just how bad the situation was and if I was going to have to come personally down to collect my items or if I would be able to have a family member come down to sign off for it. Unfortunately the situation was much worse than I had even imagined.
When I called the storage facility they said a moving company came in and dumped 10 units of items at their facility and they didn't fully pay for them and all that stuff was designated to be auctioned off but they decided to step in and try to get the items back to their owners. Worse though is that although they had ten units of stuff, I was the 18th person who called looking for their belongings. They sent me photos of the items they had but none of them were mine.
On July 21st I started emailing a lawyer we knew. While he did not do the type of legal work we needed, he got us in touch with someone who did. We found it would cost $1000 to set up with the firm and $225 an hour. If the company was being cooperative it usually wouldn't take a long time to get things worked out but if the company was being evasive the cost to track them down and force them to court could likely end up more than the cost of my belongings. The uncertainty of how much it was going to cost in the end and the fact that we were already low on cash had us not commit to getting a lawyer at that time. I was counseled, however, to file a federal movers fraud claim.
On August 1st I filed a the federal claim and it must have worked because on August 2ed I get an email from the moving company (using a different email then the costumer service one they put on my contract) and they asked me if I had received my items. I told them what had happened and how I would like to file a lost items claim. I get a email back saying that they have to check with management.
The following week when I did not hear back I asked again how to file a lost items claim and said if they did not explain how to get compensation for my items I would be contacting a lawyer. Their response was "Thank you for your email. Each client must decide what action is best for their particular situation. If your items were not located in the U mini storage facility in Denver, CO - the carrier for not advising of any other addresses to our office staff where he is storing goods. We continue to ask Carrier for information so we can provide our clients with accurate information. Our apologies. We are only as good as the information given to us by the carrier. If new developments become available, we will advise you promptly."
It has now been three months since I made the initial request for my items. This company has not given me a way to get compensation for my items and so many people have been hurt by them. The Better Business Bureau has tried to contact them but this moving company has been unresponsive. Since I made my claim the number of official claims to the BBB has jumped from 65 to over 250! THIS COMPANY NEEDS TO BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE! Please consider donating to help my family get a legal resolution and hopefully help prevent others from going through the same hardship we have faced. There are other struggles we have faced that are not mentioned here but we have gone throgh so much it has been very hard for us to get our feet back under us. While we are not sentimental people, some things we have lost are hard to replace like boardgames my husband designed himself and art that was made from a family member that can't simply be bought again. While this just makes my heart hurt, more than anything though we only want a just resolution. Thank you for all those who help us get there.