Tell me about auto-transport trucking companys please.

Have any of you bought a car and paid to have it hauled to you?

Can anyone recommend a reputable company? There seems to be a lot of them.

How do I spot a scam? At what point in the transaction are you supposed to pay? Upfront or not?

Etc.

Thanks!

There are a lot of "companies" that will take your $100.00 or so just to place your vehicle and route info on a bulletin board so that the carriers can bid on the job. The sooner you need it, the more expensive. That's all they do.. and take your money, but never guarantee a pick-up.

I had the misfortune of falling for this "Scam" when I needed my M Coupe shipped from CO. to MS. back in 2011. I waited about 7 days for them to try to secure a carrier. They guaranteed that they would find one and didn't come through. I learned a lot from this experience. I even complained to the BBB. Do a google search and you'll see the scams. I finally went with an owner-operator for a set price and it happened. I paid once delivered.

Now, I work for the Automotive Auction business. Our Company owns Ready Auto transport, and does business with 1dispatch also.

Whatever you do, don't pay for someone to place your vehicle on a list for others to bid on. Agree on a set price, and delivery date.

Good Luck!

In reply to M3Loco:

This question comes up on the forum from time to time, but I've never heard about this middle-man scam thing. Good to know.

Right, this topic comes up a lot. Do a search and you'll find lots of threads. My recommendation is always uship.com. I've used them several times. It's an Ebay style site. You list your shipping needs and haulers will bid against each other. You can also read feedback on the hauler from other customers, which is cool.

I had a car shipped to me this past spring. You're almost always going through a broker unless you're using a very high end shipper. The broker schedules with any number or independent drivers. Uship seems like a very legitimate setup and I was close to pulling the trigger with them when I found a local broker who could do it for $100 cheaper. I paid the broker and he paid the shipper. Other times the shipper is paid when the car is picked up. It just depends. You need some degree of faith that things are going to work out and that bad shippers are weeded out by the brokers for doing a bad job. You just have to hope that it's not you that they do a bad job for.
After all of that, if I had any kind of emotional attachment to the car I wouldn't ship it. I'd only ship a car I could afford to deal with a damage claim on. Otherwise I'd drive/tow it myself.

Uship is a good option. They've come a long way. Good Luck!

I have used DAS at least three times. So far they have been great. I have had maybe 5 cars shipped to me over the years, and other than an independant that I used for my first car that was leaps and bounds better than the others none have been bad aside from maybe U-ship was my worst experience. The driver that delivered the car from the U-ship deal was great, but dealing with the big broker in the Chicago area was less than fun, and I will probably not use U-ship ever again due to it. Pretty much all of my vehicles have come clean across the country with two coming from CA, one from WA, one from TX, and the first coming from GA through an independant after dealing with a larger company that was local to me. They never picked up the truck after telling me, and the seller multiple time that they would. I hired the first independant that had a truck in the area after that, and the truck was picked up within the hour. It was a whole lot more expensive due to it being an enclosed transport, but they picked up, and delivered on time, so I was okay with it.

If you are looking for a truly professional shipper who will treat your car like it's their own try these guys:

http://www.reliablecarriers.com/

or

http://exoticcartransport.com/

You can pay less, but you can also worry more. We've used both of these carriers and have been totally happy.

In reply to Joe Gearin:

Reliable is trusted with million dollar collector cars, if you wanted any better recommendation. Great guys to chat with too.

I think it's one of those things where you get what you pay for. We recently had our Fiesta shipped by Exotic Car Transport. Check out the guy doing the pre-shipping inspection: http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/project-cars/2012-ford-fiesta/fiesta-to-world-challenge/

There's a GoPro on his head so the entire process is documented.

I've thought a couple times that I'd like to drive Route 66 out west as a vacation, but then have the car shipped back while I flew. That way I wouldn't have to take as many days off. I suspect, though, that I could drive the return trip by a northern route for different scenery and still come out ahead monetarily vs shipping the car and buying plane tix.

Canoe?

I shipped a car across country recently. UShip is just another form of broker. The "winning bid" for my car was picked up by another broker. Montway or something like that. They sold the haul to another broker. Who actually hired a hauler.

I'm not making this up.

My experience was acceptable. It was ~$1400 from Jersey to Tacoma, so you can't haul much further than that and stay in the country.

They were 12 hours late picking up the car. So that means that they picked it up at midnight. The seller was a good sport, but that is just poor business in my mind. They marked up the existing damage report so much you would NEVER be able to tell if they actually damaged your car at all. They were outside of their three day delivery window by a full day - late of course.

All that said, I'd do it again. Mostly because it was easy.

Here's another high quality expensive shipping company similar to Reliable and Exotic:

http://www.horselesscarriage.com/

InterCity is also very good. I've used UShip in the past, but only dealt with the companies directly, there are some on there that aren't brokers.

At this point I'd probably use InterCity or Reliable. It's worth the slightly more expensive cost to deal with a reputable company.

When I bought my Mini from California, I used a broker to have it shipped to PA. This guy: http://pricedriteautotransport.com/

I liked that he was up front about being a broker. And the price was right (about $900 including the broker fee). Transport driver was pad cash-on-delivery.

It was an open transport, but all of the closed carriers were more than $2000. Some a LOT more. I just couldn't see spending that much money to move a $9K car.

docwyte wrote: InterCity is also very good. I've used UShip in the past, but only dealt with the companies directly, there are some on there that aren't brokers. At this point I'd probably use InterCity or Reliable. It's worth the slightly more expensive cost to deal with a reputable company.

I got quotes from some of the big guys (Reliable and another...cant remember the name). The price was over double what I actually paid another carrier. I like piece of mind, but not that much.

If you're looking to transport something nice, stick with a big company. But I have had good luck with http://www.yesterdaystractors.com/cgi-bin/haulquery.pl

Its a place where good-ole boys with trailers advertise their empty legs of haulage. I found a guy there (who unfortunately quit after getting cancer) who traveled a lot between Ohio and Arizona for work. He happened to have an F350 and a flatbed gooseneck and he picked up loads to fund the trip because he hated flying. If he got a load, he drove. If he didn't get a load he took the train. It was nice because he was just looking to pay for fuel and it was relatively cheap. Since he was basically driving cross-country, he could transport from nearly anywhere to anywhere, and it was door-to-door custom service.

Post an ad there. Most have insurance and DOT numbers and it might be a more reasonable option.

I had a miata shipped to ohio from florida a few years ago. Not really knowing anything, I googled and ended up with a broker that hooked me up with a company called Admiral's Black. The broker sucked to deal with and it cost me an extra $150. The shipper was awesome and cleaned my car before dropping it off. FWIW, you're supposed to tip the driver. I ended up also helping my driver after he dropped the car off with some trailer issues he was having.

So with all of that said, go with a big name or try to find a small guy with a route you're close to. I bet the folks at bringatrailer have some kind of resource for shippers too.

I'm currently soliciting bids for shipping a car via U-ship. I started the process last night and got a number of bids and questions. Since then, it has slowed down a bit. So far the bids are in line with the original U-ship quotes. We'll see how this pans out.

A couple of months ago, my Infiniti came from Denver to Ohio by way of this Denver company.
http://www.toponetransport.com/
More than 1200 miles cost $600 or just under 50 cents per mile. The car was brought right to my door. I was very happy and their equipment was as nice as shown on their website.

Photos of my delivery, here.

I just got a quote from a company, so I checked out their website. I'm not hating on them for doing this, but either they're using a photo from the way-back machine or they got to haul the coolest load ever.

David S. Wallens wrote: I just got a quote from a company, so I checked out their website. I'm not hating on them for doing this, but either they're using a photo from the way-back machine or they got to haul the coolest load ever.

It really needs to be enclosed transport and look like this:

David S. Wallens wrote: I just got a quote from a company, so I checked out their website. I'm not hating on them for doing this, but either they're using a photo from the way-back machine or they got to haul the coolest load ever.

I was having trouble figuring what the "brown" car was right behind the cab. I think it is a early Prelude.
That seems odd along with an otherwise full load of new 3rd Gens.

As far as spotting a scam, look up the FMCSA website. They're the organization that oversees the industry and they have a lot of good information about what to look out for. Personally, I've used the A1 Auto Transport company to haul a car I bought in Florida and had shipped to California. I would use them again, but I think the best bet is to get a few cost estimates and compare. Be cautious of any estimate that is significantly lower than all the others--that's usually a red flag.