This company operates on the quintessential definition of bait and switch. They gave me a quote for $7K, which I knew could go up. They then raised it to $9K, which was fine, and loaded all my furniture (breaking and damaging a significant portion of my items). Upon arrival, they refused to unload my property unless I paid them a total of $22K **IN CASH**!!! They literally held my furniture and clothing hostage and I felt stuck and helpless. I asked to speak with supervisors but they declined and just hung up on me, telling me to pay the ransom or lose my entire household of property. I understand the moving is not an exact science, but it is beyond disingenuous to quote 1/3 of what the final cost is, especially when I had an employee walk through my home and measure all the items and told me it would only be $9K after the phone estimate of $7K. If they had told me, I would not have used this company, which they know, hence the lie. It is immoral, unethical, and should be illegal to take advantage of customers this way. This was absolutely a bait-and-switch scheme and they charged my entire life savings as ransom. I need to be made whole, especially with the amount of damage, and I am seeking a refund of half of what I paid, which I feel is still MORE than fair, given they told me it would be $9K after doing a full inperson assessment and that it will cost me thousands to replace or repair what they damaged with neglect and carelessness. Additionally, they lied about it being employees moving me; the crew was hired off Craigslist with zero experience and it absolutely shows. Promising services and prices that were then rescinded are fraud. If needed I have the estimate I signed in person as well as photos of damaged items.
While the business did give me an updated estimate of ~$10K once I gave them the measurements and items, when their employee driver arrived to load the truck, he advised, after walking through my home and seeing, in person, all the items to be moved, that it would be ~$9K and had me sign that, which I did, before they loaded anything. (Another side note that I neglected to mention originally is that the driver was visibly stoned and smoking upon arrival, which should have been my first clue that this was going to be a nightmare.) It was not until the hired day laborers (i.e. non-professionals) had all of my items loaded on the truck and held hostage that the amount suddenly went up another 65%. This is absolutely bait and switch. The only defense possible is Bentley are *SO bad* at doing their basic job that they cannot come even within 50% of cost even after having a full extensive inventory *and* an employee walking through to visually estimate.
I would have not agreed to the hyper-inflated price except that I had no choice as they had already absconded with all of my possessions and told me I had to sign or lose everything as they would just take it to their storage facility to sell off. This threat was made more than once by multiple employees. Therefore I was forced to sign under duress and as such I do not agree that this is a legally binding agreement, much less an ethically acquired signature. What choice did I have besides losing my entire household? I tried to dispute at the time but was only met with more threats.
I don't know what to call this fraudulent deception other than bait and switch insofar as what was promised to me (with full information of what was to be moved) was 1/3 of the final price. What started as $7K went to $10K, then $16K, then $22K before it was all said and done. And, again, this was all under the duress of losing my cherished heirlooms and irreplaceable items, not just some random furniture. Beforehand I provided Bentley with measurements of every item ahead of time, so there is no way they can pretend they were surprised by what they had to load, especially since their employee visually inspected this in person. They are the professionals and should be able to estimate within a reasonable margin of error. To be off by 60% is not reasonable and is therefore unacceptable. This is either so wantonly careless as to be a failure of professional duty warranting breach of contract or by full intention (which seems more likely given everything I was told when I called to address the issue; they sounded like they expected the increase and were anticipating the steep increase) which means they knew it and failed to notify me, which is the definition of fraud (according to Black’s Law Dictionary: Fraud consists of some deceitful practice or willful device, resorted to with intent to deprive another of his right, or in some manner to do him an injury. As distinguished from negligence, it is always positive, intentional. Maher v. Hibernia Ins. Co.,67 N. Y. 292; Alexander v. Church, 53 Conn. 501, 4 Atl. 103; Studer v. Bleistein. 115 N.Y. 31G, 22 X. E. 243, 7 L. R. A. 702; Moore v. Crawford, 130 U. S. 122, 9 Sup. Ct. 447,32 L. Ed. 878; Fechheimer v. Baum (C. C.) 37 Fed. 167; U. S. v. Beach (D. C.) 71 Fed.160; Gardner v. Ileartt, 3 Denio (N. Y.) 232; Monroe Mercantile Co. v. Arnold, 108 Ga. 449, 34 S. E. 176.Fraud, as applied to contracts, is the cause of an error bearing on a material part of the contract, created or continued by artifice, with design to obtain some unjust advantage to the one party, or to cause an inconvenience or loss to the other. Civil Code La. art. 1S47.Fraud, In the sense of a court of equity, properly Includes all acts, omissions, and concealments which involve a breach of legal or equitable duty, trust, or confidence justly reposed, and are injurious to another, or by which an undue and unconscientious advantage is taken of another.). What Bentley is doing is a quintessential example of this definition in action. As for the ability to file a claim for the extensive and pervasive damage done, fine, I can go through that headache, however, the point is that I shouldn't have to! I hired professional movers, not friends or people from Craigslist, specifically to avoid having my items destroyed or damaged in the move. The fact that Bentley has insurance is great, but not an excuse to lie about who would be handling my items (I paid for vetted employees as promised, not inexperienced amateurs who told me multiple times they were hired for the day from Craigslist) and the care with which they would transport everything. Getting a small settlement after arguing with a claims adjuster is not the same as having my items in original condition. Some of these things cannot be repaired nor replaced and getting some depreciated amount is a slap in the face.
Additionally, Gwen, the saleswoman, promised me that part of what I was paying for would be to have all my furniture and boxes moved into the home to the rooms in which they belonged and the furniture would be reassembled and ready to use. Once the truck showed up at my new home I was told they could only empty the truck in the driveway and I would have to do everything else. I spent hours moving furniture and boxes inside which lead to me throwing out my back, which defeated the purpose of hiring professionals to begin with!! My items were left still haphazardly wrapped in moving plastic and exposed to the elements. It took me hours in the dark to get everything where it would be safe, not even finalized. I am still, after a month, working to inventory all the damage done and get things where they belong.
Bentley also had all my information on the address to which they were delivering and had ample opportunity to ensure they could get here. I don’t think I can emphasize enough that they are the professionals and therefore have more duty owed than me the ignorant customer. My parents live next door and had Allied Moving company move them from NJ for less than half of what Bentley charged and they had no issues getting their truck here. Bentley, however, with no warning, sprung on me the day of delivery that it would cost another few thousand dollars to pay for a "shuttle" to get my stuff to my house. This is my complaint about the cash request since I had to scramble to find the money (I am not the kind of person who has that lying around; this move ended up wiping out my entire life savings and I still had to borrow money to pay the ransom) and work with my bank to get such a large amount of cash for them as this was wildly unexpected.
I called and spoke with a supervisor who told me they did not care, it wasn’t their problem, and I could either pay them the cash ransom or they would steal my possessions and sell them (and sounded like she hoped I would chose this absurd option and acquiesce to their threat so they could make even more money). When I requested to have my call escalated to her supervisor she simply said no and hung up on me and then declined to speak with me further when I made multiple attempts to resolve this issue, hence this complaint. I would have much rather worked cordially with the company, however, they made it painfully clear that they do not care about me and almost seemed to take joy in robbing me. The callousness with which my concerns were ignored was chilling and I am still incredulous that such interactions can happen with a business.
This is a blatantly fraudulent bait-and-switch scheme since the services promised and the price quoted were both so radically wrong. I paid more than 60% above what was anticipated while receiving a fraction of the service I was promised and had paid for, which means Bentley is in breach of contract. The point of consumer protection laws is to prevent this sort of egregious manipulation to take advantage of helpless customers. If the services rendered do not match what was promised and there are over ten thousand dollars of hidden costs, this is not just bad business practice, but criminal.
The facts are clear that Bentley is operating a dangerous scheme designed to disadvantage unsuspecting consumers who have no recourse in the moment. Moving is a stressful and overwhelming time, which Bentley intentionally preys on to steal from customers. As such, I want to be made whole and refunded for the excess surprise costs and the underperformance of what was promised. I was still willing to pay the ~$9 to 10K that was estimated when the employee inventoried, with measurements, all my items. As this was not met upon my initial request, I am now also demanding an additional refund for the lack of services rendered and the inconvenience I have experienced having to move everything inside and reassemble myself. The time, physical pain, and emotional stress caused by this entire ordeal have been excruciating and should never have been committed against me by a business.
Based on what was quoted and the lack of service provided, I feel $7K is reasonable to pay and therefore I am asking for a $15K refund since the ~$10K included services that were not provided and I was forced to do them myself. I have personally had to spend over 120 hours doing what had been promised; based on the $15 per hour they paid the Craigslist workers, this is already almost $2K owed and I am still undoing the damage and getting things moved from the garage to the house. I am not seeking the pain and suffering owed, just to be made whole.
Bentley Moving and Storage Reviews
This company operates on the quintessential definition of bait and switch. They gave me a quote for $7K, which I knew could go up. They then raised it to $9K, which was fine, and loaded all my furniture (breaking and damaging a significant portion of my items). Upon arrival, they refused to unload my property unless I paid them a total of $22K **IN CASH**!!! They literally held my furniture and clothing hostage and I felt stuck and helpless. I asked to speak with supervisors but they declined and just hung up on me, telling me to pay the ransom or lose my entire household of property. I understand the moving is not an exact science, but it is beyond disingenuous to quote 1/3 of what the final cost is, especially when I had an employee walk through my home and measure all the items and told me it would only be $9K after the phone estimate of $7K. If they had told me, I would not have used this company, which they know, hence the lie. It is immoral, unethical, and should be illegal to take advantage of customers this way. This was absolutely a bait-and-switch scheme and they charged my entire life savings as ransom. I need to be made whole, especially with the amount of damage, and I am seeking a refund of half of what I paid, which I feel is still MORE than fair, given they told me it would be $9K after doing a full inperson assessment and that it will cost me thousands to replace or repair what they damaged with neglect and carelessness. Additionally, they lied about it being employees moving me; the crew was hired off Craigslist with zero experience and it absolutely shows. Promising services and prices that were then rescinded are fraud. If needed I have the estimate I signed in person as well as photos of damaged items.
While the business did give me an updated estimate of ~$10K once I gave them the measurements and items, when their employee driver arrived to load the truck, he advised, after walking through my home and seeing, in person, all the items to be moved, that it would be ~$9K and had me sign that, which I did, before they loaded anything. (Another side note that I neglected to mention originally is that the driver was visibly stoned and smoking upon arrival, which should have been my first clue that this was going to be a nightmare.) It was not until the hired day laborers (i.e. non-professionals) had all of my items loaded on the truck and held hostage that the amount suddenly went up another 65%. This is absolutely bait and switch. The only defense possible is Bentley are *SO bad* at doing their basic job that they cannot come even within 50% of cost even after having a full extensive inventory *and* an employee walking through to visually estimate.
I would have not agreed to the hyper-inflated price except that I had no choice as they had already absconded with all of my possessions and told me I had to sign or lose everything as they would just take it to their storage facility to sell off. This threat was made more than once by multiple employees. Therefore I was forced to sign under duress and as such I do not agree that this is a legally binding agreement, much less an ethically acquired signature. What choice did I have besides losing my entire household? I tried to dispute at the time but was only met with more threats.
I don't know what to call this fraudulent deception other than bait and switch insofar as what was promised to me (with full information of what was to be moved) was 1/3 of the final price. What started as $7K went to $10K, then $16K, then $22K before it was all said and done. And, again, this was all under the duress of losing my cherished heirlooms and irreplaceable items, not just some random furniture. Beforehand I provided Bentley with measurements of every item ahead of time, so there is no way they can pretend they were surprised by what they had to load, especially since their employee visually inspected this in person. They are the professionals and should be able to estimate within a reasonable margin of error. To be off by 60% is not reasonable and is therefore unacceptable. This is either so wantonly careless as to be a failure of professional duty warranting breach of contract or by full intention (which seems more likely given everything I was told when I called to address the issue; they sounded like they expected the increase and were anticipating the steep increase) which means they knew it and failed to notify me, which is the definition of fraud (according to Black’s Law Dictionary: Fraud consists of some deceitful practice or willful device, resorted to with intent to deprive another of his right, or in some manner to do him an injury. As distinguished from negligence, it is always positive, intentional. Maher v. Hibernia Ins. Co.,67 N. Y. 292; Alexander v. Church, 53 Conn. 501, 4 Atl. 103; Studer v. Bleistein. 115 N.Y. 31G, 22 X. E. 243, 7 L. R. A. 702; Moore v. Crawford, 130 U. S. 122, 9 Sup. Ct. 447,32 L. Ed. 878; Fechheimer v. Baum (C. C.) 37 Fed. 167; U. S. v. Beach (D. C.) 71 Fed.160; Gardner v. Ileartt, 3 Denio (N. Y.) 232; Monroe Mercantile Co. v. Arnold, 108 Ga. 449, 34 S. E. 176.Fraud, as applied to contracts, is the cause of an error bearing on a material part of the contract, created or continued by artifice, with design to obtain some unjust advantage to the one party, or to cause an inconvenience or loss to the other. Civil Code La. art. 1S47.Fraud, In the sense of a court of equity, properly Includes all acts, omissions, and concealments which involve a breach of legal or equitable duty, trust, or confidence justly reposed, and are injurious to another, or by which an undue and unconscientious advantage is taken of another.). What Bentley is doing is a quintessential example of this definition in action. As for the ability to file a claim for the extensive and pervasive damage done, fine, I can go through that headache, however, the point is that I shouldn't have to! I hired professional movers, not friends or people from Craigslist, specifically to avoid having my items destroyed or damaged in the move. The fact that Bentley has insurance is great, but not an excuse to lie about who would be handling my items (I paid for vetted employees as promised, not inexperienced amateurs who told me multiple times they were hired for the day from Craigslist) and the care with which they would transport everything. Getting a small settlement after arguing with a claims adjuster is not the same as having my items in original condition. Some of these things cannot be repaired nor replaced and getting some depreciated amount is a slap in the face.
Additionally, Gwen, the saleswoman, promised me that part of what I was paying for would be to have all my furniture and boxes moved into the home to the rooms in which they belonged and the furniture would be reassembled and ready to use. Once the truck showed up at my new home I was told they could only empty the truck in the driveway and I would have to do everything else. I spent hours moving furniture and boxes inside which lead to me throwing out my back, which defeated the purpose of hiring professionals to begin with!! My items were left still haphazardly wrapped in moving plastic and exposed to the elements. It took me hours in the dark to get everything where it would be safe, not even finalized. I am still, after a month, working to inventory all the damage done and get things where they belong.
Bentley also had all my information on the address to which they were delivering and had ample opportunity to ensure they could get here. I don’t think I can emphasize enough that they are the professionals and therefore have more duty owed than me the ignorant customer. My parents live next door and had Allied Moving company move them from NJ for less than half of what Bentley charged and they had no issues getting their truck here. Bentley, however, with no warning, sprung on me the day of delivery that it would cost another few thousand dollars to pay for a "shuttle" to get my stuff to my house. This is my complaint about the cash request since I had to scramble to find the money (I am not the kind of person who has that lying around; this move ended up wiping out my entire life savings and I still had to borrow money to pay the ransom) and work with my bank to get such a large amount of cash for them as this was wildly unexpected.
I called and spoke with a supervisor who told me they did not care, it wasn’t their problem, and I could either pay them the cash ransom or they would steal my possessions and sell them (and sounded like she hoped I would chose this absurd option and acquiesce to their threat so they could make even more money). When I requested to have my call escalated to her supervisor she simply said no and hung up on me and then declined to speak with me further when I made multiple attempts to resolve this issue, hence this complaint. I would have much rather worked cordially with the company, however, they made it painfully clear that they do not care about me and almost seemed to take joy in robbing me. The callousness with which my concerns were ignored was chilling and I am still incredulous that such interactions can happen with a business.
This is a blatantly fraudulent bait-and-switch scheme since the services promised and the price quoted were both so radically wrong. I paid more than 60% above what was anticipated while receiving a fraction of the service I was promised and had paid for, which means Bentley is in breach of contract. The point of consumer protection laws is to prevent this sort of egregious manipulation to take advantage of helpless customers. If the services rendered do not match what was promised and there are over ten thousand dollars of hidden costs, this is not just bad business practice, but criminal.
The facts are clear that Bentley is operating a dangerous scheme designed to disadvantage unsuspecting consumers who have no recourse in the moment. Moving is a stressful and overwhelming time, which Bentley intentionally preys on to steal from customers. As such, I want to be made whole and refunded for the excess surprise costs and the underperformance of what was promised. I was still willing to pay the ~$9 to 10K that was estimated when the employee inventoried, with measurements, all my items. As this was not met upon my initial request, I am now also demanding an additional refund for the lack of services rendered and the inconvenience I have experienced having to move everything inside and reassemble myself. The time, physical pain, and emotional stress caused by this entire ordeal have been excruciating and should never have been committed against me by a business.
Based on what was quoted and the lack of service provided, I feel $7K is reasonable to pay and therefore I am asking for a $15K refund since the ~$10K included services that were not provided and I was forced to do them myself. I have personally had to spend over 120 hours doing what had been promised; based on the $15 per hour they paid the Craigslist workers, this is already almost $2K owed and I am still undoing the damage and getting things moved from the garage to the house. I am not seeking the pain and suffering owed, just to be made whole.