AMSA questions MovingSCAM's motives | RELO Roundtable...a gathering place

AMSA questions MovingSCAM’s motives

By Eric Anders • Sep 30th, 2011 • Category: *RELOCATION NEWS UPDATES*, American Moving and Storage Association (AMSA), MovingScams, ProMover

Moving industry association disheartened by Walker's personal attacks

Hatfield–McCoy feud(1) AMSA questions MovingSCAMs motives

Responding to comments that owner Tim Walker made at his popular trash-your-mover website, MovingSCAM.com, Linda Bauer-Darr, the President and CEO of the American Moving and Storage Association posted the following defense of AMSA's ProMover Program.

The exchange is over a "Statement from AMSA" thread posted in the Open Forum by an involved industry participant.

"Despite the continued tough economy, our membership is growing. We now have more than 3,500 members and expect to add at least 500 more in the coming months. Interest in AMSA by the supplier community remains high. And most importantly, our ProMover program is increasingly recognized. During our Moving Day on Capitol Hill visits on Sept. 13, a top aide to a House member who supports our consumer advocacy efforts told us, without prompting, that ProMover must be working in the marketplace, since this lawmaker's office has seen a noticeable drop in consumer complaints about rogues.This is an achievement we can all be proud of, and one we can all take credit for. ProMover by its very nature is and must be a symbiotic program – we depend on our ProMover members to help us get the message out to the public, and the more that happens, the more successful we are at eliminating rogues."

In his first public post in months, MovingSCAM's founder and owner responded with “I'm not sure where this quote came from, but let's just call it what it is… bullshit.”

It didn't take long for Walker's response to make it's way to Washington. Not only did it capture the attention of members of the national trade association for the professional household goods moving industry, but also, apparently, several members of the U.S. Senate.

The head of the AMSA felt so strongly about Walker's observation that she posted the following response:

Tim – Curious about what is going on here. Two years ago MovingScam.com visited our offices for the day. Over lunch and briefings on AMSA and the ProMover program, we talked about our shared commitment to rid the industry of rogues to support both consumers and the hard working profesional movers who dont deserve to have their industry painted with a black eye by rogues.

Later you speak at our conference. After the conference i remember personally speaking with you and your brother and appreciating the kind words you shared with me about the great progress AMSA was making and how much you enjoyed the conference and meeting so many of our great mover members.

Since then we have done nothing but expand the ProMover program. The first year we created this program, we kicked out 200 of our members. 200 paying members. Since then we have expanded our ProMover oversight board by double, we have added more teeth to the program requirements and we have brought on California and now are in the process of bringing on Michigan and Pennsylvania to begin intra-state ProMover programs. We have been commended by FMCSA and Congress for taking a hard line against the rogues that are hurting consumers and killing our business.

It is a long process to brand and grow recognition of an effort like the ProMover program – most consumers dont buy mover services regularly like they might with carpet cleaning services or appliance repair. So we work extra hard to get the word out. And we are making progress. This year alone, we were recognized in the USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and Consumer Reports. And we work on an almost weekly basis with BBB on a long list of initiatives to involve them in helping us alert consumers to the ProMover screening program.

So I am disheartened when you suggest that my recent statement about the comments made during Moving Day on the Hill was false (actually you used a more colorful term). And I feel like we may have actually taken a step backwards when you ridicule our use of the terms rogues as opposed to rogue or scam movers. You are in a position to help us differentiate between the hard working people whose families have built their moving businesses on grindingly hard physical labor year after year in difficult situations and those who choose to make an easy buck off an unknowing consumer. We are movers, they are crooks, scammers, rogues…whatever term you like but please not movers.

Tim – You can help us. We want to get rid of scammers to help consumers and help movers. I hope you agree with that mission. – Linda Darr

It will be interesting to read Walker's reply and subsequent discussions to the topic.

Historically MovingSCAM has a habit of striking out and removing dissenting industry sentiments or barring anyone from posting who doesn't agree with the owner's or moderators' personal opinions about the household goods moving industry.

MovingSCAM owner calls out AMSA’s ProMover program – RELO Roundtable

Waiting Time = Hostage Load??? – RELO Roundtable

A schism at MovingSCAM? - RELO Roundtable

Movers lined up at the hanging tree – RELO Roundtable

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Tagged as: American Moving and Storage Association (AMSA), moving scams, MovingScams, ProMover, Rogue Movers

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Anonymous

Eric,

You know full well that last paragraph is false. You’ve enjoyed putting your own spin on little bits and pieces from MS since you left, which exactly what you complain about MS doing.

Anyway, here is Tim’s follow-up to Linda Darr’s response:

“Hi Linda, It’s an honor to have you join the
conversation here, and I thank you for taking the time to post. To be
honest, I’m wondering what’s going on over there. When I first read the quote I
didn’t know who wrote it, so try not to take it personally. I just don’t
understand how you couldn’t know that the senator’s aide was wrong? You have
your own complaint department, and I’ve even provided AMSA with access to the
complaint database here so it should have been at least somewhat suspicious when
you heard that complaints are down. I agree with you that there needs to
be more cooperation. We’ve tried… the volunteers here provide regular feedback
to AMSA about problem companies, as well as information you asked up to provide
in order to help you with your pro-mover
program. As I said before, we’ve provided you with access to our complaint
database. We offered to publish monthy news from AMSA, and while we quit
receiving them from AMSA I’ve left the articles that were provided to me up
online, and link to them from our home page. On the other hand, we don’t
receive any information from you guys unless we beg and plead. For years AMSA
has provided us with sourcebooks so we can direct people to AMSA if they have a
problem with and AMSA member company. As of my last request you now want
somewhere between $1000 and $2000 for us to have the information we need so that
we can help you. I’ve been told enough
times that AMSA would also provide us with access to the AMSA Today newsletter,
and had that request dry up and go nowhere, that I have given up asking you for
it. Cooperation is a two-way street Linda. As far as the
Pro-Mover program goes, I like the idea and we’ve said plenty of positive things
about it here. It might be gaining some momentum with your members, and I hope
it is, but in all honesty it hasn’t resinated with consumers at all. It’s a
great concept, but not all good concepts work in the real world. I’ll still back
it and hope it works though. I do understand where you’re coming from
when you call the scammers “rogues”, but it’s always rubbed me the wrong way.
It’s dishonest. These guys don’t advertise under the “Rogue” heading in the
yellow pages, they advertise under “moving companies”. They generally have, or
have had, a license. They send people moving estimates, and show up at your
house in a moving van. In the eyes of a consumer they are a moving company, and
to call them by vague names seems like a pleasant way to try to sweep the
problem under the rug, but your members still have to compete against these
companies every day. Call them what you want, but they’re here. We can
work together to clean this industry up, but they key is working together, not
us working for you and you taking all of the credit. The volunteers here,
professional and consumer, have been working tirelessly for 10 years to help
this industry and they deserve more credit than they’ve been given.
Tim”

People may be contacting Congress less and less to file compliants, but that does not mean that the number of compliants has gone down, just that they’re not getting to Congress.
Eric Anders

Thanks for dropping by, Sharon. Appreciate your interest in my little website!

In case you forgot, I didn’t leave MovingSCAM. Several of the site’s owners and moderators decided to cancel my membership and barred me from posting when they didn’t like my professional point of view.

The issue is documented in my MovingSCAM Disclosure http://reloroundtable.com/blog/consumer-protection/movingscams/movingscam-disclosure/ which was published last year.

What evidence do you have that the number of consumer complaints regarding movers is not going down? If you read the latest information, the fact the number of complaints against rogue movers are diminishing is likely because the number of folks using professional full-service movers has been dropping steadily. That’s because more of the increased use of pseudo moving services like those endorsed by MovingSCAM.

Unfortunately, since those freight transportation companies that MovingSCAM touts aren’t regulated like legitimate household goods and personal property carriers, consumer with complaints have absolutely NO RECOURSE under the federal Consumer Protection Regulations. They can’t complain!

In case you didn’t the recent RELORT article, Senate relies on industry pros to rout out rogue movers, http://reloroundtable.com/blog/consumer-protection/senate-relies-on-industry-pros-to-rout-rogue-movers/ the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, http://reloroundtable.com/blog/consumer-protection/senate-investigates-household-goods-carriers-and-move-brokers/ is conducting an investigation into the practice of moving companies holding household goods “hostage” to extract additional money from individuals and families mid-way through their moves.

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