Steven review for Stateway Auto Transport Inc.

Review Description

I am posting my story first, then Stateway's rebuttal from another review website, then my response to their rebuttal. Judge for yourself! "If they tell you they go the extra mile for their customers, THEY REALLY MEAN IT. In my case, it turned out to be an extra 553 miles extra, which was evident when the car was received...with the gas tank empty and the odometer with 553 more miles on it than when they picked it up. This is a rather long story, but the bottom line is: USE STATEWAY AT YOUR OWN RISK. After reading this, YOU WILL HAVE BEEN WARNED. The indications were there right from the start, and I should have been smart enough to recognize them. Upon receiving many different quotes for shipping the car from Rancho Mirage, California to Vero Beach, Florida, I picked Stateway, who was neither the highest, nor the lowest bid. They impressed me because they make a big deal out the fact that they use their own trucks. Yes they do HAVE SOME, but my suspicion is that most of their business is done as an aggregator, taking the business and giving it to another trucker. They make no mention of this policy, but imply that others who do offer an inferior service. This is from their website: "What Makes Us So Different? We Are a Carrier Unlike so many of our competitors, Stateway Auto Transport is a fully insured and licensed carrier. This means that we own our own trucks and that we cut out the middleman for our customers. Why is this important? Being a carrier is essential in getting vehicles moved as quickly and efficiently as possible." Huh!!?? First of all, the original agreement sent to me by Stateway was totally inaccurate. It had the wrong address on it; the cost for their service did not reflect what they had quoted me; the recipients phone number was incorrect; and the model number on the car was incorrect. This was important because they indicated that if the car was longer or wider than expected, there would be an additional charge. The car they cited incorrectly was 9 inches shorter than mine. Based on my experience with Stateway, once you have booked them, they will not answer any calls or respond to emails in any way, regardless of how many you send. It was only after I refused to pay the deposit that they attempted to correct the agreement, a process that took 4 attempts before they got it right. It was comical... they would fix one problem and not the others. Then they would correct the other problems and the first problem would revert to being incorrect again and so on and so on...... My brother-in-law had also originally contracted with them to pick up his car from the same location, but to be dropped off in Connecticut. I emailed Rachel to see if they could pick up both cars at the same time to save the housekeeper from having to go to the house twice. Her emailed response: "yes". Based on that response, we booked them, not realizing that they never planned to pick up both cars up at the same time. My brother-in-law, eventually canceled with them after waiting several weeks for a pickup. They then, with no authorization from me, scheduled my pickup with an outside carrier. In fact they scheduled it twice before I authorized it. The third time, again without my authorization, they scheduled a pick up, but fortunately for them, the car was ready. Because I was overseas, I scheduled them to contact my sister and drop the car off with her. She received a call one day from Stateway saying that the driver was two hours away from Vero Beach, and had been trying to contact her. She called the phone number they gave her, left several messages with the answering service, and canceled her appointments and waited to no avail. Not only did the car not show up on time, but it disappeared totally from the radar . Here is an excerpt from what I emailed to them at that point: "Now, a few minutes ago, (my sister) received a call back from the driver that Sara (from Stateway) gave her the number for, and told her that there is no Lexus on the truck. Is there someone at your company that has any clue as to what is going on? More importantly, where is my car?" As it turned out, the driver completely bypassed Vero Beach and took the car 4 hours south, to Miami, where it sat for two weeks in a "secure location", according to Susie, the manager at Stateway. She went into great detail with me describing all of the snafus that happened along the way with this job, including employee disruptions, incompetence, etc, etc. The car was finally delivered to me on around June 16th, nearly 2 weeks after they had originally committed. THIS IS WHERE THE REAL PROBLEMS STARTED I was still overseas and received an email from the estate of the previous owner saying that they received a bill for $4 due to my car passing through a toll without paying in Miami, Florida at midnight. The bill came with a photo confirming that it was indeed my car with the original California plates. HUH? I immediately contacted the guy looking after the car to confirm the mileage on the car and it was indeed 553 miles higher than when it had left California and the gas tank was empty. I confirmed the extra mileage to Stateway by producing a Notarized document confirming the mileage prior to shipment when the sale of the car was made. Obviously, not only was my car NOT in a secure location, but it was left to be driven around by some idiot without my permission. Simply put, it is auto theft and someone will be held accountable. I have since spent over $3000 to fix the car. It had only 9764 miles on the odometer when it left California, but 553 unauthorized miles later it had balding tires and the front end was out of alignment. The Battery was nearly dead and had to be replaced and the rear brakes were seizing, needing replacement. Based on this, I had to assume the unauthorized drivers were not babying the car and so I requested a full service in it also. Stateway has not taken responsibility for any of this, other than the office Manager, Susie, committing to speaking to AIMEE TRANSPORT, IN MIAMI, who supposedly kept the car in "a VERY secure location". For the record, her promises were empty and it remains unresolved. Believe it or not, this report is simply a summary of the problems we had. For the entire ugly story,based entirely on documented facts, we are in the process of building a website : www.statewayautoproblems.talkspot.com. In it, I will document my adventure with them from beginning to end and it will allow others who have had similar problems to provide content. It is still under construction so be patient! " The first thing they did was get my review removed saying that they had no record of me being a customer. I fixed that and had it reposted, so they then responded on the websites with the following: STATEWAY AUTO RESPONSE "We at Stateway value every customers oppinion and are always striving to better our service based off of the feedback we recieve. With that said, it is important to point out a few very important points regarding this order. First and foremost the company that transported Mr. Steven Argosy's vehicle was not Stateway Auto Transport but was a subcontractor called Aimee Transport. Our company is a broker/carrier which means that we ship on our own trucks and utilize subcontractors when necessary. All of the companies we work with are fully insured, as we are, and have been in business for at least five years. When this customer received their vehicle on delivery he did not file a damage report and signed for the vehicle accepting it in a 'as is' condition. WE STRONGLY RECOMEND THAT ALL CUSTOMERS DO A THOROUGH INSPECTION OF THEIR VEHICLE ON DELIVERY PRIOR TO SIGNING ANY PAPERWORK. Then a few days after the car was in his possesion, Mr. Argosy decided to call our office and demand that we fix his vehicle. Mr. Argosy's claims that we used a subcontracted carrier without notifying him are propesterous as every customer, upon the dispatching of their vehicle, receives several automaticly generated notification and confirmation emails letting them know who will be picking up the vehicle, when the vehicle will be picked up and the drivers personal phone number in case they need to reach them. When Mr. Argosy attempted to file a claim with the Carrier's insurance, they denied it based on the simple fact that he did not report the claim upon receiving his vehicle. We had explained all this in great detail but Mr. Argosy insists that our company be held responsible for the alleged actions of a completely separate third-party trucking company. We also have emails from Mr. Argosy stating that unless we send him a check, he will write up negative reviews for our company on multiple sites in an attempt to sabotage our business. This is blackmail by definition and our lawyers have been contacted. We tried to reach out to this customer numerous times since he posted this review but he has refused to answer any of our calls or emails. We thank you for taking the time to read this response and visiting our page. We hope you have a great day! " MY REBUTTAL TO STATEWAY I have replaced my full name with asterisks. STATEWAY CLAIM: "We also have emails from Mr. *******stating that unless we send him a check, he will write up negative reviews for our company on multiple sites in an attempt to sabotage our business. This is blackmail by definition and our lawyers have been contacted." RESPONSE: First of all,you don't need a lawyer for this. Blackmail is a criminal offense, not a civil one. If you truly have this email, give it to the police. Produce this email that I supposedly sent. If you cannot produce it, then it is because it is not true, and do not try to manufacture one because that will be simple to refute and manufacturing evidence is definitely a criminal offense. STATEWAY CLAIM that I signed off on the vehicle "as is". RESPONSE: My sister accepted the vehicle after delivery looking for damage because I was out of the country. Who would think to look for bald tires caused from unauthorized reckless use while the car was supposedly in Aimee Transportations "secure" lot? STATEWAY CLAIM "Then a few days after the car was in his possesion, Mr. *******decided to call our office and demand that we fix his vehicle" RESPONSE: Here is an excerpt from my email to Stateway. Judge for yourself if I was demanding payment: "Unfortunately the saga of the Lexus has continued, and not in a good way. I received notification of two toll violations in Miami at 12:15 am with a photo of the Lexus and the plate. I have not yet had the mileage checked on the Lexus vs what it was when it left California, but I will have that in the next few days. I sincerely hope that this car was not being used when it was supposedly in storage. Perhaps you can ask your supplier, Aimee for an explanation. There was no authorization given from me for anyone to drive that car other than on and off the truck." Maybe Stateway can read a demand to fix the car in that, I certainly cannot. Also, I defy them to show that I called their office at ANY time after the discovery was made. That leaves only email: to that I say "Show Me". STATEWAY CLAIM " Mr. ******claims that we used a subcontracted carrier without notifying him are propesterous " RESPONSE: Where did I make that claim? Please show me in my review where it is as you claim, or in any email I sent. Actually, I sent them an email on June 3rd, four days after the car was picked up asking who had the car. Here is their response. "Good Afternoon, the name of your carrier is CP Auto Transport 786-353-2468 Your COD due to the driver is 800.00. Kim" So obviously I knew there was a sub carrier. Unfortunately, it looks to me like they had no idea who actually had the car, as it was actually Aimee Transport. Give you a warm and fuzzy feeling? STATEWAY CLAIM: When Mr. ******attempted to file a claim with the Carrier's