Onebyone

We moved twice in one year and used a moving company to move the furniture and packed boxes. DH and I packed boxes of all items not furniture and the movers moved those with the furniture. They shrinked wrapped all the furniture to keep dings and scratches from happening. The drawers stayed packed as is. The only furniture they took apart were the beds. The only tip I know is by packing everything ourselves ready to be moved saved a lot of money. The movers charged by the mile plus the time an how much we had to move. A person from the company came and looked at what we had to move to where and gave us the cost before we signed.

Claire123

Get some estimates in advance. You never know. If you'd like to rent your own truck, go to Ryder and reserve one, again, do that now also.
Try to let everyone know - utilities, cc companies, health professionals.
Be careful with any liquids - you don't want a spill.
Make sure you can find all legal documents quickly - passports, etc.

rjwilder

Ask about insurance, usually if you pack the box yourself it is insured for $1.00 or less a pound. That's ok if it's just clothing, dishes, nothing big and expensive. So, if a box gets lost or the contents damaged you're only getting $10. if the box weighed 10 pounds. The movers usually wrap everything with shrink wrap and use moving blankets to protect your things. If you are moving big expensive TV's have the movers pack it and buy insurance, they are on the hook for it if it's lost or broken. The insurance is also good if they break your dining room chair or rip the upholstery on your sofa, etc. Also ask how many other loads will be on the truck with your stuff. The movers build a wall using your furniture, and the next house of furniture goes in behind your stuff. Sometimes depending on the amount of stuff there can be two to three customers stuff on one truck. Ask how many loads they will have on the truck and when will your things be picked up and delivered. Also ask what happens if the other load or loads on the truck with your things cancel. Your load may be delayed until they get another load to go with yours, if this happens the movers will off load your things into storage and reload it later at their expense. This happened to us and it was 4 weeks later when we got our things delivered. All big moving companies operate this way.