Terrible Industry

Caroline Hagen Submitted this review about Magic Carpet Auto Transport
Review made Live: 1/26/2010 5:34:00 PM
My car was picked up almost three weeks later than the date I requested (December 21). No one contacted me during those three weeks to explain, apologize or help. After my repeated calls to Magic Carpet (not all of which were returned when I had to leave a message), the broker Stephanie finally emailed me that the car would be picked up on January 16. (My dates may be off a day or two but the gist of what happened here is accurate). Unfortunately I missed a cell phone message from her a few days before that informing me that the car would only be picked up if I agreed to give the driver $900 instead of the $710 that was the quote (to the driver plus the brokers fee). I missed that pick-up date but finally agreed to the extra charge so a driver picked up the car around January 20. The other surprise was that the driver demanded another $200 for the personal items left in the back (college kid leaving school) which I understood would be no charge if they did not block the windows. When I called Stephanie about that, she quoted me 100 lbs of personal items as well as not blocking the windows as free but I did not recall the weight limitation nor did I see it in the paperwork from Magic Carpet. Also my college kid says there was NOT 100 lbs of clothes and stuff in the car. However the driver felt that there was 300 lbs. which he apparently was able to calculate with his eyeballs since he quoted that to the friend from whom he picked up the car without benefit of any weighing.
SO we got the car across the country three weeks late and for hundreds of dollars more than the original quote. I understand it was over the holiday period but everybody knew that from the beginning and that there were snowstorms on the East Coast (not sure if that affected transport out of Florida) but the lack of communication and casualness about the unexpected charges was not professional. We will just sell the next kid's car.

Company Response
Terry Williams from Magic Carpet Auto Transport Submitted this response.
Response Date: 1/26/2010 7:41:00 PM
Caroline~I am sorry to hear that you did not recieve a complete 5 star service. However, the additional amount that was charged was due to the driver not being in the area and was going out of his way to pick your car up so he gave us and offer that we than gave to you. I tried working with you on the price that was requested. I clearly said it was an offer so i am sorry if i didnt make that clear to you that you do not have to agree to that price.Also, with the additional amount that was added when the driver arrived to pick up the car, they were able to clearify with the pick up contact that it was ok with the additional charge. So that also was out of my hands. I do apologize that you didnt feel i communicated with you enough, i do appreciate you letting me know that. i will however make a improvement on that. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions.~Stephanie~