Quote:
Originally Posted by onevoice
There is no reason to use a broker TO SHIP A CAR
Car shipping is a small pimple on the ass of the domestic transportation market. Private car shipments are too small for my line of work, and are highly specialized. Like I said, my office makes 10's of thousands of shipments a year. Plus I only ship for companies, not individuals.
If you are shipping a single car every once in a while, my advice is to only deal with the big dogs in the car shipping world. They know the ins and outs of insurance, and have a reputation to uphold. That will be a big thing in your favor.
If you need to ship for business and do it with frequency, you will make contacts with many carriers. Cultivate a relationship with a carrier that does a good job for you (in the office, not just a courteous driver) and use them for everything. This is where a broker may help, they will have a relationship and "pull" with carriers because of the volume they do. Relationships and trust matter, whether with a carrier or a broker.
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Now I know what you are saying,
But in some ways I will have to disagree about Brokers vs the Big Names. I don't have any cars shipped by our company but over the last 10 Years I have shipped a Dozen Cars Nationally & Internationally. I do have a Broker that I first started with that has taken care of 95% of what I have shipped. Most of these were open Transport (2 were enclosed) and the Price that I received was well below what a Big Name transporter charges. In fact as an example I had one car going from Tampa to Seattle that the guy wanted Enclosed and I had an identical car coming from Seattle to Tampa on Open Transport. These cars literally criss-crossed each other coming across the Country. The Open Transport was $950 and the Enclosed was $2700 - The Open Transport had no Problems and the Big Name Enclosed damaged the transmission by putting it in gear after strapping it down. I also had Reliable do a Enclosed Transport for me. I told them I would meet them 2 Blocks from my House in a Church Parking Lot due to low trees on my street. The Driver insisted on trying to make it. He drove over one of my neighbors lawn, took out Two trees and the Power Lines on my street AND he still ended up a block away. I also have had a Big Name (Passport) take an Order from and then couldn't pick it up. Then they wanted me to switch to Exotic. I decide to go another route and the Exotic would not stop calling me for 2 weeks.
So to me, it's all a Crap-Shoot!