As moving scams increase, protecting your moving company’s reputation is more important than ever. Unfortunately, even honest moving companies experience lost or damages items occasionally. To protect your company’s brand, you need to manage these claims effectively.
Moving Scams Impact Your Business
According to Consumer Affairs, moving scams may have increased during 2020. In the most common scheme, a dishonest moving company demands a down payment. Later, they claim the load is bigger than expected and demand more money. The victim’s belongings may be held hostage until the additional payment is made.
You might think these scammers don’t impact your legitimate moving company, but that’s not exactly true.
According to Transport Topics, rogue operators are a threat to the entire industry. “To the legitimate moving industry, the impact is when people have a bad move they sometimes will talk to news outlets,” Katie McMichael, director of American Trucking Associations’ Moving and Storage Conference says. “It just puts a stain on the moving industry overall, because people don’t know how to separate a rogue operator from a legitimate operator.”
Dishonest movers are eroding the public’s trust in the moving industry. This means you have to work extra hard to prove your company is trustworthy – especially when problems arise.
Manage Moving Claims to Improve Trust
Your moving customers are putting everything they own in your care. If their belongings are lost or damaged and you can’t make things right, they might share their story with others – and your company might get lumped in with the bad actors out there. Don’t let that happen.
- Reduce moving claims. Prevention is ideal. Make sure that difficult items – like mattresses and electronics – are packed correctly to avoid claims.
- Create a quality control process to make sure best practices are always followed.
- Give fragile and high-value items extra attention. Certain items, such as artwork and other items valued at more than $5,000, need to be moved in a solid wood crate.
- Offer quality moving insurance. Ideally, nothing will go wrong – but if something does go wrong, you want it to be made right as quickly as possible. An all-risk moving insurance policy will cover general damage that may occur during the course of a move, as well as catastrophic losses. Provide this option to your customers and encourage them to accept it.
See 8 Tips to Reduce Moving Insurance Claims for more ideas on how to keep your customers’ belongings safe.
At RIG, we have in-house claims handling to ensure that your customers are always taken care of. We work hard to be a positive extension of your moving company’s brand. If you’re not an affiliate yet, contact us. We welcome the opportunity to work with the industry’s most conscientious and service-focused moving companies.