Close Page

Shopping Price for Interstate Moves

(It's what you don't know that may hurt you.)

By Christopher Noblit

People who are moving are rightly concerned about moving cost and obtain many estimates in search of the best price. Unfortunately, “best price” doesn’t really exist in our business. That’s a statement with some extreme ramifications, and an explanation is in order:

All major movers (Mayflower, Allied, United, North American, etc…) use the same rate book; it’s called “Tariff 400-M” and it is published by the Household Goods Carriers’ Bureau. You will see “Tariff 400-M” listed as being used on each of your estimates. Tariff 400-M contains the charges for transportation, packing, storage, etc... These charges are essentially the same for all of the major moving companies (if each has the same weight and mileage estimate).

This being true, if you were to clone your move and ship your goods with each of the major movers you would find that, while you may have had four vastly different estimates, in the end each mover was just about the same cost (provided that each mover is giving the same level of discount).

So why were your estimates so different? “Low-Balling” (purposely giving a low estimate to mislead the customer) may be one reason, inexperienced estimators another. In the end, you pay the actual weight and mileage charges, regardless of the estimate.

So be aware of how it works; and hopefully, you won’t be misled by a salesperson who cares more about commission than the safety of your goods and the accuracy of your estimate.

This document is the copyrighted, intellectual property of Avatar Moving Systems, Inc. and may not be reprinted or reproduced without the express, written permission of Avatar (www.avatar-moving.com).