Have you ever wondered why certain businesses are more “popular” or at the top of the list in your search engine? Well in most cases the businesses that are at the top of the page have reviews, exact phrases you are searching, or content specific. However, the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation conducted a study and found far from creditable business practices being performed. In the study many of the businesses being affected were moving and storage companies.
What happens is a consumer searches the Web for a reputable moving company in their area, they click on the first or second link to come up. These websites have names that are confusingly close to the names of real and honest moving companies, so the consumer believes it to be at a reputable website. The website is typically a broker who will ask for a “deposit” for setting up the move and writing up an estimate for your shipment, but in actuality it is a brokerage fee and not a deposit. The fee pays for the website to be the middleman and advertise the move to be hauled by a moving company not associated with the broker.
The moving company that agrees to haul your shipment is under no obligation to honor the estimate provided by the broker. The moving company unfortunately cannot explain the previous transaction because they not affiliated at all with these brokerage websites. The brokerage website are getting to the top of the search engine pages because they pay other companies to put their hyperlinks on websites that have nothing to do with moving and storage. Having more paid hyperlinks on websites about unrelated topics gives a false impression that these companies are popular. To decipher between a broker and a reliable moving company, one should look for both their MC-number (motor carrier number) and their DOT number (Department of Transportation number) on their website. These numbers are required to operate legally in the United States. Other ways to check out these websites is to call or look for the Better Business Bureau logo and always look for the ProMover Logo.